JPH0685795B2 - Nursing assistance robot - Google Patents

Description

Description: TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION The present invention relates to a nursing assistance robot for performing nursing assistance for a bedridden patient or a critically ill patient, for example.

[Technical Background of the Invention and Problems] Bedridden patients and the elderly are moved to bathrooms, toilets, hospital rooms, etc., and bathed, hugged from a bed, and placed in a position to reduce the burden on caregivers such as nurses. There is an increasing demand for the development of nursing assistance robots for assisting tasks such as conversion and transfer to wheelchairs. One of the nursing assistance robots for answering such a request was filed by the applicant of the present invention.
No. 60-92237.

Such a nursing assistance robot can raise the patient by an operator's operation, move the patient by holding it up, or take a bathing posture while holding it, which is extremely useful for reducing the burden on the nurse's labor. It is a thing. In such a nursing assistance robot, the robot itself determines when the posture of the patient can reduce the burden and anxiety on the patient, and the nursing posture can be determined in a stable state, and the optimal posture of the patient can be determined. It is desirable to realize automatically.

[Object of the Invention] The present invention has been made in view of such a conventional problem, and it is determined whether or not the patient is in an optimum posture by observing the load distribution of the patient on the patient support members of the left and right robot arms. It is an object of the present invention to provide a nursing assistance robot that can judge the patient's posture and automatically make the patient take an optimal posture to assist the patient in a comfortable posture.

[Configuration of the Invention] In view of the above problems, the present invention provides a nursing assistance robot, which includes a robot main body 7 provided with a control unit 13 provided on a carriage 5 that can travel in any direction, and the robot main body. 7
A pair of upper arm members 17 rotatably driven at one end to a pair of arm mounting brackets 15 movably provided up and down, and an elbow joint provided at the other end of the pair of upper arm members 17 A pair of forearm members 21 one end of which is rotatably drivable to the member 19, and a pair of patient support member brackets 23 pivotally supported by a rotary shaft 24 provided at the other end of the pair of forearm members 21. And the rotary shaft on the bracket 23 for the patient supporting member.
A pair of patient support members 25 fixedly provided in parallel with 24, and a plurality of fluid mat type pressure sensors 27 provided on the pair of patient support members 25, and the support specified on the plurality of fluid mat type pressure sensors. Pressure distribution data of each pressure sensor generated when the patient K is placed in the posture and the storage device RAM of the control unit 13 in advance.
And the ideal pressure distribution data and the patient K in the designated supporting posture from the supporting postures stored in the ROM and the ROM (43, 45).
The body shape information is compared and calculated to optimally control the posture of each arm of the robot.

[Embodiment of the Invention] FIGS. 1 and 2 show a nursing assistance robot according to an embodiment of the present invention, in which casters 1 and 1 are attached to the four corners of the bottom surface and drive wheels 3 are attached to the left and right of the central portion. The robot body 7 is mounted on the trolley portion 5 that can travel in any direction by. The robot main body 7 includes a robot arm 9, which is composed of a plurality of joints capable of individually controlling the left and right movements.
In addition, it is provided with a left and right robot arms 9 and 11 and a control unit 13 for electrically controlling the carriage unit 5.

A pair of left and right upper arm members 17 are connected to the left and right robot arms 9 and 11 so as to be swingable in the vertical direction in FIG. 1 with respect to an arm mounting bracket 15 that is vertically driven by a lifting device of the robot body 7. This upper arm member 17
On the other hand, a pair of left and right elbow joint members 19 are interlockingly connected, and further, a pair of left and right forearm members 21 are connected to the elbow joint member 19 so as to be swingable in the left and right direction in FIG. A pair of left and right support plate brackets are attached to the lower end of the forearm member 21.
23 is rotatably supported by a rotation shaft 24, and a patient support member 25 is connected to the support plate bracket 23.

In this nursing assistance robot, the control unit 13 drives the rotary shafts of the left and right robot arms 9 and 11 when the operator operates the operation box, so that the left and right patient support members 25 as shown in FIG. The patient can be held horizontally and moved while keeping the same height. Further, as shown in FIG. 5, one robot arm 9 is connected to the other robot arm 9.
The patient supporting member 25 can be supported at a position higher than 11 and by tilting one patient supporting member 25 at an angle so that the upper half of the patient can be held up.

In such a nursing assistance robot, as shown in FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, an appropriate number of channels of a fluid mat type pressure sensor 27 such as an air mat type or a water pillow type are provided on the upper surfaces of the pair of left and right patient supporting members 25, 25. Minutes, for example, 5 channels each are attached as in the embodiment. A fluid tube 29 communicating with each channel is connected to a pressure measuring unit in the control unit 13 through the robot arms 9 and 11.

As shown in FIG. 3, in the patient load distribution measuring system for supporting the patient on the supporting members 25, 25, the fluid tube 29 of the pressure sensor 27 of each channel is connected to the pressure transducer 31. The load applied to the pressure sensor 27 of each channel is converted into an electric signal by the pressure converter 31, and the amplification unit 33,
An arithmetic unit given to the parallel input / output unit PIO37 via the A / D converter 35 and for load distribution measurement via the system bus 39.
It is input to the CPU 41. Furthermore, this system is equipped with a random access memory 43, a read only memory 45, a floppy disk controller FDC47 and a floppy disk driver FDD49, and a serial input / output device SIO.
Equipped with 51. A CRT display terminal 53 is connected to the serial input / output device SIO51, and a control system of each drive axis of the left and right robot arms 9 and 11, that is, a position control module PCL55, a servo amplifier 57, and a servo motor 59 are driven. Connected for the number of axes.

The operation of this control system will be described with reference to FIGS. For example, floppy disk controller FDC47,
With the floppy disk driver FDD49, set the ideal shape of the load distribution on each pressure sensor 27 of the left and right patient support members 25, 25 when supporting the patient horizontally or raising the upper body in ROM 45. Keep it. Then, data regarding the height and weight of the patient to be handled is input to the RAM 43 from a terminal (not shown), and then the posture to support the patient is designated-step
61-63.

When the arm drive is executed after this input, the load distribution applied to each channel of the pressure sensors 27, 27 of the left and right patient support members 25, 25 is measured by the CPU 41 and compared with the ideal distribution-steps 64-66. The load distribution measurement result is displayed by the CRT display terminal 53 as shown in FIG. 4 or 5. In the example shown in FIG. 4, the measurement result of the load distribution when the patient K is supported horizontally is shown for each channel N.
o.1-No.10 is displayed in a graph. In Fig. 5, the load distribution when the upper half of the body is lifted and supported is shown in a graph for each channel.

In this way, the actual load distribution is compared with the ideal load distribution of the same support posture from among the preliminarily input support postures, and when the ideal distribution state is reached with a certain allowable range, K indicates that the robot arms 9 and 11 are supported in an optimum posture, and the driving of the robot arms 9 and 11 is stopped and the state is maintained.

In this way, the operator can automatically or manually support the patient in the optimum posture while observing the load distribution displayed on the CRT display terminal 53. Further, since a pressure sensor of the fluid mat type such as an air mat type or a water pillow type is used as the pressure sensor 27, a soft feeling can be given to the patient K, and the discomfort of the patient can be reduced. . Also,
The pressure sensor 27 of the fluid mat type is connected to the measuring section in the control section 13 by the fluid tube 29, and since the electric part is separated from the robot arms 9 and 11 in this way, the patient bathes. Even when it is used for assistance, the system can be stabilized without failure due to water intrusion.

In FIG. 3 of the above embodiment, a thermoelectric converter 71 such as a thermocouple for measuring the fluid temperature in the fluid mat type pressure sensor 27, an amplifying device 73 for the output of the thermoelectric converter 71 and an A / D converter. The converter 75 is connected to the PIO 37 for compensating the temperature change of the pressure measurement, and corrects the pressure calculated by the CPU 41. This temperature correction is performed as necessary, and may not be provided if strictness is not required.

FIG. 7 shows another embodiment of the present invention, in which an air mat 77 is provided on the front end side of the patient support member 25 of the robot arms 9 and 11 and an air cylinder 79 provided on the support plate bracket 23 side. It is connected with the air tube 81.
As shown in FIG. 8 (a) or (b), the attachment method of the air mat 77 to the patient support member 25 is such that the base 83 of the air mat 77 is provided with a locking projection 85 and the patient support member is
It is configured to be locked to a locking portion 87 provided at the front end of 25.

In this way, supply of air to the front end of the patient support member 25,
If the releasable air mat 77 is attached, the plate-shaped patient support member 25 can be inserted under the patient K while the air mat 77 is deflated.
Then, after that, air is blown into the air mat 77 from the air cylinder 79 to expand the air mat 77, and as shown in FIG.
If the front end of 25 is in a bulged state, the air mat 77 prevents the patient from falling when holding the patient K, and gives the patient K a great sense of security.

[Advantages of the Invention] In the present invention, a fluid mat type pressure sensor is provided on each of the patient support members of the left and right robot arms to measure the load distribution when the patient is supported. By doing so, it is possible to judge whether the patient is supported in the optimal posture, and the operator does not need to operate the robot arm movement while watching the patient's posture or ask the patient directly to operate the optimal posture. There is an advantage that the operation to realize is easy. In addition, by using a fluid mat type pressure sensor, it is possible to soften the feeling of hitting the patient, and even when the robot arm is immersed in water as in the case of bathing assistance, the infiltration of water There is an advantage that the operability can be improved without concern that the signal system will break down.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side view of an embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a plan view of the above embodiment, FIG. 3 is a view of a load measuring system used in the above embodiment, and FIG. 4 is a case where a patient is supported in a horizontal posture. 5 is an operation explanatory view in the case of supporting the upper half of the patient in a raised state, FIG. 6 is a flowchart explaining the operation of the above embodiment, and FIG. 7 is another embodiment of the present invention. 8A and 8B are exploded perspective views showing an example of a method of attaching the air mat to the patient support member. 1 ... Caster, 3 ... Drive wheel, 5 ... Truck section 7 ... Robot body, 9,11 ... Robot arm 13 ... Control section, 15 ... Arm mounting bracket 17 ... Upper arm member, 19 ... … Elbow joint member 21 …… Forearm member, 23 …… Bracket for support plate 25 …… Patient support member 27 …… Fluid mat type pressure sensor 29 …… Fluid tube, 31 …… Pressure transducer 41 …… Calculator 53 ...... CRT display terminal

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a nursing assistance robot, a robot main body 7 provided with a control unit 13 provided on a trolley unit 5 capable of traveling in an arbitrary direction, and provided so as to be vertically movable with respect to the robot main body 7. A pair of arm mounting brackets 15, one end of which is provided rotatably at one end, and a pair of upper arm members 17,
A pair of forearm members 21, one end of which is rotatably connected to an elbow joint member 19 provided at the other end of the pair of upper arm members 17,
A pair of patient support member brackets 23 pivotally supported by a rotary shaft 24 provided at the other end of the pair of forearm members 21, and fixed to the patient support member bracket 23 in parallel with the rotary shaft 24. A pair of patient support members 25 provided, and a plurality of fluid mat type pressure sensors 27 on the pair of patient support members 25, and the patient K is placed on the plurality of fluid mat type pressure sensors in a designated support posture. From the pressure distribution data of each pressure sensor generated at the time of performing and the support posture data stored in the storage devices RAM43 and ROM45 of the control unit 13 in advance, the ideal pressure distribution data in the designated support posture and the body shape information of the patient K are displayed. A nursing assistance robot characterized by performing a comparative calculation and optimally controlling the posture of each arm of the robot.