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Clinical Trials Begin For Russia's First Medical Exoskeleton
pRobotika writes: Seven hundred people volunteered to try out the ExoAtlet when the Russian startup advertised its imminent clinical trials. Only a handful of these could be accommodated when testing of Russia's first medical exoskeleton began recently in a Moscow hospital. It's the latest step in the Skolkovo-backed innovation's battle to reach the market, and progress is looking phenomenal. The video features the coolest looking exoskeleton testers we've seen in a long time.
There are dozens of medical based exo-skeltons under development all over the west. Most are much better advanced than the pictures of this monstrosity (it's huge). The most famous of the western prototypes allowed a woman with below the neck paralysis (no arm or leg control) to walk across a room unaided by any other human. Based on the pictures of this "Russian version" this is at best a crutches assistance, not a full assist in that it requires the user to use crutches.
Frankly this isn't even newsworthy. They've had better technology for far longer elsewhere. There are even systems being developed that directly interfaces to the nervous system of the operator requiring no outside control, IIRC correctly the full paralysis version I mentioned above had such an interface.