Collaborations with the Rehabilitation Research Institute Singapore

On the 13th of November, we hosted a delegation from the Rehabilitation Research Institute Singapore (RRIS). The purpose of this visit was to further develop and formalise our collaborative links in areas of common interest. Professor Michael Nilsson is Visiting Professor at the LKC School of Medicine in Singapore and during his visits to Singapore in recent time, the links with RRIS have deepened. Professor Sarah Johnson has also visited RRIS recently and hosted our guests at the Faculty of Engineering in the morning.

We spent a stimulating afternoon sharing learnings about ongoing and planned projects of the Centre for Rehab Innovations and the Rehabilitation Research Institute, Singapore. A common focus for CRI and RRIS is to better understand and develop science-based supports therapies to optimise the well-being, mental health and social connectedness of the people we work with. Psychosocial function influences all aspects of function and recovery / rehabilitation. We’re underway to engage 1000 people having a knee replacement surgery in Australia to collect comprehensive psychosocial as well as physical health information as we build a data-driven prediction tool for recovery in our SuPeRKnee study, for example.

RRIS delegation with our Director Prof Michael Nilsson (far right)

The RRIS is doing some impressive work – some projects we liked: The Ability Data Project is establishing an Asian-centric movement database consisting of kinetic and kinematic data from a range of people with and without specific neuromotor impairments, with a focus on stroke and knee osteoarthritis. Some movement data will be collected over time – imagine the possibilities for predicting recovery trajectories and also programming rehab and assistive tech really specifically to meet people’s movement needs.

RRIS are also working on data-driven clinical precision and decision-support tools to guide precision medicine approaches. Of course we love this, and it was excellent to talk about commonalities in our approaches, values and vision.

Home-based and long term rehab support in homes is a focus for RRIS. We shared learnings in telehealth and intelligent home-tech – RRIS wants to ‘make every home a gym’.