Can a socially assistive robot support patients in cardiovascular rehabilitation? To answer this question, in collaboration with medical specialists, we designed and conducted a real-world long-term study, lasting 2.5 years, at the Fundacion Cardioinfantil-Instituto de Cardiologıa clinic (Bogota, Colombia) within the context of the outpatient phase of their cardiac rehabilitation programme. The study aimed to compare the patient progress and adherence in the conventional cardiac rehabilitation programme (control condition) with the deployment of a fully autonomous socially assistive robot that continuously monitored the patients during exercise to provide immediate feedback and motivation based on sensory measures (robot condition). The explicit aim of the social robot is to improve patient motivation and increase adherence to the programme. We recruited 15 patients per condition. The cardiac rehabilitation programme was designed to last 36 sessions (18 weeks) per patient. The findings show that adherence increases by 15% and the optimal recovery heart rate after one minute of the training end (> 22 bpm, successful Cardiac Rehabilitation programme performance) was reached successfully in the robot condition. In contrast, the patients who were not assisted by the robot did not achieve the optimal recovery heart rate in all stages. Moreover, we also show that the healthcare staff and patients’ attitudes towards the robot are mainly positive. The benefits are acknowledged by those who worked in collaboration with the robot.

中文翻译：

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现实世界中用于长期心脏康复的社交辅助机器人

社交辅助机器人能否支持患者的心血管康复？为了回答这个问题，我们与医学专家合作，在 Fundacion Cardioinfantil-Instituto de Cardiologıa 诊所（哥伦比亚波哥大）的门诊阶段设计并进行了一项为期 2.5 年的真实长期研究。他们的心脏康复计划。该研究旨在比较传统心脏康复计划（控制条件）中患者的进展和依从性与部署完全自主的社交辅助机器人的情况，该机器人在运动过程中持续监测患者，根据感官测量（机器人条件）提供即时反馈和动机。 ）。社交机器人的明确目标是提高患者的积极性并提高对计划的依从性。我们针对每种情况招募了 15 名患者。心脏康复计划设计为每位患者持续 36 个疗程（18 周）。研究结果表明，在机器人条件下，依从性提高了 15%，并且在训练结束一分钟后（> 22 bpm，成功的心脏康复计划表现）成功达到了最佳恢复心率。相比之下，没有机器人辅助的患者在所有阶段都没有达到最佳恢复心率。此外，我们还表明，医护人员和患者对机器人的态度主要是积极的。这些好处得到了那些与机器人合作的人的认可。