Can a powered transport wheelchair reduce fatigue of caregivers? - A pilot study

For an aging society, dependent elders increase, so as caregivers. Caregivers spend much time taking care of the elders, so it'll impose great burden on them. Many researchers had developed various powered transport wheelchairs with the assumption that they can reduce caregivers' burden. However, there is no objective evidence to verify the hypothesis. Thus, this pilot study compares the degree of fatigue between pushing a manual and pushing a powered transport wheelchair. Eight healthy participants (22 to 29 years old) are recruited for this study and each of them pushes the manual and powered transport wheelchairs in a random order. The differences of rating of perceived exertion (RPE), vital sign, peak force and reaction time of pushing are measured before, during and after each trial. In the aspect of physical fatigue, RPE, heart rate (HR) and respiratory rate (RR), the results demonstrate smaller increase in the powered transport wheelchair than in the manual one. However, there is no obvious difference in blood pressure, nor the peak force and reaction time of the performance test. Although the change of peak force and reaction time for each participant seemed not sensitive to in this pilot study, the parameters of RPE, HR, and RR do demonstrate the difference while pushing a manual wheelchair and a powered transport wheelchair.