The authors have developed a knee-ankle-foot orthosis with a joint unit that controls knee movements using a microcomputer (Intelligent Orthosis). The Intelligent Orthosis was applied to normal subjects and patients, and gait analysis was performed. In the gait cycle, the ratio of the stance phase to the swing phase was less in gait with the knee locked using a knee-ankle-foot orthosis than in ...

In addition to changes in spatio-temporal and kinematic parameters, patients with stroke exhibit fear of falling as well as fatigability during gait. These changes could compromise interpretation of data from gait analysis. The aim of this study was to determine if the gait of hemiplegic patients changes significantly over successive gait trials. Forty two stroke patients and twenty healthy sub...

Distinct gait characteristics like short steps and shuffling gait are prototypical signs commonly observed in Parkinson's disease. Routinely assessed by observation through clinicians, gait is rated as part of categorical clinical scores. There is an increasing need to provide quantitative measurements of gait, e.g. to provide detailed information about disease progression. Recently, we develop...

Normal gait is a pattern of walking that humans normally adopt in undisturbed situations. Gait patterns are considered to be either abnormal or impaired if they do not satisfy certain key attributes of normal gait. It has previously been postulated that normal gait is more energy efficient than abnormal or impaired gait. However, it is not clear whether a normal gait pattern is also superior to...

BACKGROUND The relationship between frailty and gait characteristics other than velocity has received little attention. Gait variability quantifies the automaticity of gait with greater variability usually indicating an irregular and unstable gait. High gait variability reflects the loss of gait regulation and predicts mobility decline and falls, which may reveal systemic vulnerability. Thus, w...

Most of gait recognition algorithms involve walking cycle estimation to accomplish signature matching. However, we may be plagued by two cycle-related issues when developing real-time gait-based walker recognition systems. One is accurate cycle evaluation, which is computation intensive, and the other is the inconvenient acquisition of long continuous sequences of gait patterns, which are essen...

BACKGROUND The important purpose of a powered gait orthosis is to provide active joint movement for patients with spinal cord injury. OBJECTIVES The aim of this study was to clarify the effect of a powered gait orthosis on the kinematics and temporal-spatial parameters in paraplegics with spinal cord injury. STUDY DESIGN Quasi-experimental. METHODS Four spinal cord injury individuals expe...

[Purpose] The purpose of this study was to determine the change of allocation of attention caused by a difference in gait phase and gait speed. We also determined the relationship between attentional demand and gait automaticity change caused by the gait speed alteration. [Subjects and Methods] Ten male participated. Participants were instructed to perform the probe reaction time (RT) task duri...

[Purpose] Gait velocity and trunk acceleration during semicircular turning gait with and without carrying a hand-held bag were compared in females of very advanced age. [Subjects and Methods] Ten female volunteers of very advanced age who could walk independently were recruited for this study. Gait velocity and trunk acceleration were measured using an accelerometer during semicircular turning ...

Walking is an automated rythmic motor behavior that is mostly controlled by subcortical brain regions. Automaticity implies that gait can be performed without attention. However, recent works highlight the involvement of attentional resources in gait, using a "dual-task" methodology in which performance on attention-demanding tasks such as spoken verbal response and walking is compared when the...