Development of New Methods to Control the Energy Expenditure of Walking in Patients with Osteoarthritis
G.M. Ungureanu, A. Constantin and R. Strungaru
Spontaneously, each individual, healthy or ill, tends to adopt a walking pattern so that they reach the minimum energy expenditure of the walking. The osteoarthritis at a supporting joint or at the lumbar spine produces the modification of this optimal walking pattern, which results in an increase of the optimal energy expenditure, the current study a software being developed to analyze and interpret all these changes. The ground vertical reaction forces are recorded for the patients in this study and the instantaneous coordinates of the resulting vertical reaction is computed. The following results are provided in the developed software: the walking trajectory, the cyclogram, the walking parameters, the characteristics of the sensors, the speed. These parameters are integrated in a database in order to define a mathematic model necessary to monitor and correct the energy expenditure during walking at patients with osteoarthritis of the lower limbs and lumbar spine.
Keywords: Energy expenditure, gait analysis, osteoarthritis, signal processing, diagnosis, walking patterns.