A remote guidance system for blind and visually impaired people via vibrotactile haptic feedback

Trained guide dogs and canes provide the visually impaired with the highest degree of independence; however, they are very limited in guiding the user towards a specific desired location, especially in an unknown environment. The assistance of other people represents a feasible solution, but it does not improve the idea of autonomous guidance and privacy. In this paper we present a remote guidance system which provides the visually impaired with haptic directional cues, useful for navigating in unknown environments. The blind user is equipped with a pair of camera glasses, two vibrotactile bracelets and a cane which is used to avoid potential obstacles. The video captured by the camera glasses is streamed to a remote operator who can properly navigate the impaired person by activating the vibrotactile stimulations. The proposed approach has been validated on a group of blind subjects in an indoor scenario. Results revealed the effectiveness of the proposed strategy for the guidance of visually impaired in unknown environments.