1 / 5

Effects of Hip Joint Stiffness on Assistive Gait Using Reciprocating Gait Orthosis

This study investigates the effects of increased hip joint stiffness on the gait of individuals using a lower-limb paralysis simulator to simulate the reciprocating gait orthosis. The aim is to determine if increased hip joint stiffness improves gait efficiency and walking speed in individuals with lower-limb paralysis. The findings suggest that increasing hip joint stiffness may indeed increase walking speed for reciprocating gait orthosis users.

jgaylord
Download Presentation

Effects of Hip Joint Stiffness on Assistive Gait Using Reciprocating Gait Orthosis

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Modeling effects of sagittal-plane hip joint stiffness on reciprocating gait orthosis-assisted gait William Brett Johnson, PhD; Stefania Fatone, PhD, BPO(Hons); Steven A. Gard, PhD

  2. Aim • Determine effects of increased hip joint stiffness on gait of nondisabled persons using lower-limb paralysis simulator (LLPS). • LLPS enabled nondisabled persons to exhibit characteristics of reciprocating gait orthosis (RGO)-assisted gait • Relevance • Upright ambulation may improve quality of life for persons with lower-limb paralysis. • However, walking with RGO can be slow and exhausting. • Increased RGO hip joint stiffness may improve gait efficiency.

  3. Method • While nondisabled subjects walked with LLPS at four different hip joint stiffness settings, we measured: • Hip flexion. • Crutch ground reaction forces (GRFs). • Oxygen consumption. LLPS.

  4. Results • Walking speed was observed to initially increase with increases in hip joint stiffness, and then decrease. • Oxygen cost was observed to initially decrease with increases in hip joint stiffness, and then decrease.

  5. Conclusion • Findings suggest that increasing hip joint stiffness may increase walking speed for RGO users.

More Related