Monitoring visual attention on a neurorehabilitation environment based on interactive video

The use of new technologies in neurorehabilitation has led to higher intensity rehabilitation processes, extending therapies in an economically sustainable way. Interactive Video (IV) technology allows therapists to work with virtual environments that reproduce real situations. In this way, patients deal with Activities of the Daily Living (ADL) immersed within enhanced environments [1]. These rehabilitation exercises, which focus in re-learning lost functions, will try to modulate the neural plasticity processes [2]. This research presents a system where a neurorehabilitation IV-based environment has been integrated with an eye-tracker device in order to monitor and to interact using visual attention. While patients are interacting with the neurorehabilitation environment, their visual behavior is closely related with their cognitive state, which in turn mirrors the brain damage condition suffered by them [3] [4]. Patients’ gaze data can provide knowledge on their attention focus and their cognitive state, as well as on the validity of the rehabilitation tasks proposed [5].