Noninvasive tongue-motion controlled computer mouse for the disabled

BACKGROUND: A patient whose spinal cord was damaged due to accident may result in Tetraplegia or lose the ability to control his/her daily living environment. Currently, patients must use an invasive tool tongue movement, to help the patient communicate with the external environment. OBJECTIVE: This study designed a non-invasive tongue movement computer mouse system that allows the patient to use tongue movement to control a computer to communicate with the external environment. METHODS: Via a pressure sensor and assistive holder designed in this study, the pressure sensor can be moved using the assistive holder close to the mylohyoid muscle of the patient's lower jaw. The changes in pressure from the mylohyoid muscle are converted into computer mouse control signals to control a computer to communicate with the external environment. RESULTS: This study is based on ISO9241-Part 9 to design four kinds of training modes with varying difficulties. The data were collected from five able persons participating in the test over 7 days. The data includes throughput, path efficiency, test completion time and reaction time. The data verifies that the proposed system is stable and practical for persons with disabilities. CONCLUSION: The non-invasive computer mouse system for sensing tongue movement can completely breakthrough the limitations of the invasive tongue movement sensing system. This study uses non-invasive, simple tongue movements that correspond to the stretching and shrinking of the lower jaw mylohyoid muscle to control the computer mouse.