A telerobotic system for nursing care offering a realistic visual experience

Abstract

The increasing demand for nursing care, in the context of a shortage of qualified care professionals, underscores the necessity for technological support systems. The present paper proposes a virtual reality-based teleoperation system for supportive manipulation tasks in a care-related setting. The system incorporates a robotic arm, a virtual reality headset with a single controller and a fixed stereo camera that transmits a remote scene to the user. A user study was conducted with eight participants, the objective of which was to evaluate the feasibility and user experience of the system. Following the completion of a demographic questionnaire and the Affinity for Technology Interaction scale, participants were permitted to familiarise themselves with the setup. Thereafter, they were required to utilise the robot to transfer three different deformable objects across a bed. All participants successfully completed the experimental tasks, thereby demonstrating the general feasibility of the approach. However, the efficiency of the task was found to be contingent upon the properties of the object in question. The system exhibited acceptable usability, with reported levels of mental workload and cybersickness indicating opportunities for further optimisation. These findings suggest that immersive teleoperation is a promising approach for supportive nursing tasks. Improvements in system usability, operator comfort and assistance functions are necessary before its practical application.