Kymu

Home rehabilitation in Switzerland is failing patients. Only 20 to 50% of home exercise programmes are actually followed. After 36 sessions the regular entitlement to physiotherapy ends, and therapists get nothing for the travel to patients in retirement and nursing homes.

Team: Elia Salerno, Stepan Vedunov
Services: UX/UIresearch3Dbrand
Date: 2025–now
Role: Product Designer, Research Associate

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TL;DR

Problem: Only 20 to 50% of home physio programmes are followed, and regular physio ends after 36 sessions. Patients are left to keep going on their own.
My role: Product designer. Research, UX/UI for the therapist platform, the phone and the TV, the exergames and the brand.
What I did: Turned prescribed exercises into full-body games on any TV, tracked by a phone camera, with a platform where therapists set up exercises and follow the data.
Outcome: More than CHF 100k in grants, tested with more than 20 people from patients to therapists, a clinical pilot with Lucerne Cantonal Hospital, and 2 design awards, in Switzerland and China.

An older man raises his arm in front of a TV running a Kymu racing game, while a physiotherapist with a clipboard watches.

Side by side: a phone camera view of a woman squatting, and the TV showing the game it controls. — The phone tracks the movement, the TV shows the game.

The Kymu therapist platform analysing a squat, with a 3D skeleton and joint-angle curves over time. — The therapist platform, checking how an exercise was done.

The Kymu therapist platform on a laptop, with a patient's progress charts. — Following a patient's progress between visits.

Context

Kymu turns rehabilitation exercises into full-body games on any TV, guided by a therapist. It started as my bachelor thesis with Elia Salerno at ZHdK, for children with rare neuromuscular diseases. Since March 2026 it has been an official research project at ZHdK's Digital Health Design Living Lab, and we have widened it to orthopaedic and geriatric rehabilitation for adults: more than 50,000 patients a year in Switzerland instead of fewer than 1,000, and a faster regulatory path.

My role

UX and research across the whole service, from the therapist platform to the phone app and the TV.
Designed the motion-controlled exergames, modelled in Blender.
Created the brand, from the logo and guidelines to the design language and communication material.
Ran design iterations and usability tests with more than 20 people, from patients and healthy adults to physiotherapists.
Fundraising and partners. Grant applications, hospitals and clinics, and pitching.

Where it started

Kymu began with children. For the thesis we started from the evidence on paediatric neuromuscular therapy. Literature reviews and expert interviews kept pointing at the same problems: low adherence to home exercises, little data to personalise therapy, and a heavy logistical load on families.

Research overview: target groups, synthesised core problems and project goals. — The thesis research: target groups, the main problems, and the goals we set from them.

The thesis version, for children: the teaser video. Plays from YouTube.

Three phone screens of the Kymu app: the home screen with today's training and a training overview, a shoulder exercise in progress with a timer, and a progress screen after a racing game. — The phone app: today's training, an exercise in progress, and the progress after a game.

From children to adults

The problems we found weren't specific to children. Adults in orthopaedic and geriatric rehabilitation have the same gap between the clinic and home, and there are far more of them: over 50,000 patients a year in Switzerland, against fewer than 1,000 with rare muscular diseases. That's a 50 times larger market and a faster regulatory path, so we widened Kymu to adults.

The mission stayed the same: rehabilitation that is motivating and accessible in the long term.

Any TV, one phone

Kymu needs no special hardware. A smartphone pairs with a normal TV or monitor. The phone's camera tracks the pose in real time and turns movement straight into gameplay. The same setup works on a ward and in a living room.

A woman does a squat in her living room in front of a TV running a Kymu game, filmed by a phone on a ring-light stand. — The setup in a living room: the phone tracks the movements, which are turned into game action on the TV.

The games

Three games are built so far, each mapped to physiotherapy exercises. Because the movement is decoupled from the game, the same game can train different exercises, chosen by the therapist.

A low-poly rabbit leaps from a grassy bank towards a glowing lily pad on a pond. — Achtung Wasser. Game goal: time the rabbit's jumps perfectly so he makes it to the other side of the river.

A low-poly orange spaceship flies between planets and floating obstacles through a starry sky. — Sternenreise. Game goal: fly through the laser gates to avoid damage to your spaceship.

A low-poly orange car races along a country road past trees and crates. — Strassenheld. Game goal: race down a country road, avoid obstacles and earn coins.

The therapist platform

Kymu's motion engine tracks more than 30 clinical protocols, from a single joint's range of motion to functional movements. In the platform, therapists check how an exercise was done and catch compensation movements, adjust each patient's parameters, and build training plans.

A gallery of exercise figures in the Kymu therapist platform, from shoulder rotations to squats. — The exercise library.

The Kymu therapist platform on a laptop, with a patient's exercises and training plan. — A patient's exercises and plan.

The movement and adherence data give therapists something objective to adapt the care plan on, with AI support, and can automate reimbursement reporting.

From the clinic to home

Kymu is built as continuous care. It starts in person and ends with the patient training on their own, long after the regular sessions run out.

Service map of the patient and caregiver journey. — Patient and caregiver service map.

Service map of the therapist journey. — Therapist service map.

Outcome

CHF 100k+Raised for Kymu R&D
30+Clinical exercise protocols the motion engine tracks
20+People tested the system, from patients to therapists
2 design awardsSDA Bachelor Design Award 2025 and a New One merit award (China)