Authors:
Karina Cristina Alonso
1
;
Enio Walker Azevedo Cacho
1
;
Eliza Regina Ferreira Braga Machado de Azevedo
2
;
Fernando Tardeu Bueno Martin
2
and
Alberto Cliquet Junior
1
Affiliations:
1
Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of Campinas – Unicamp, Brazil
;
2
Faculty of Medical Sciences, University of Campinas - Unicamp, Brazil
Keyword(s):
Kinetic, Kinematic, Gait, Ankle foot orthoses, Paraplegic.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Biomedical Engineering
;
Biomedical Instrumentation
;
Biomedical Instruments and Devices
Abstract:
Objective: To assess the influence of rigid ankle foot orthoses (AFOs) on paraplegic gait with neuromuscular electrical stimulation (NMES). Methods: Ten control subjects and five complete paraplegics went through kinetics and kinematics gait evaluation without and with AFOs. Paraplegics also used 4 channels NMES, walker aided. Results: Cadence, in steps per minutes (94.6/6.8; 84.97/13.15; 13.02/4.11; 16.1/2.29), step length, in meters (1.31/0.15; 1.19/0.17; 0.55/0.11; 0.6/0.11) and % stance time (61.5/1.8; 62.93/3.37; 87.8/7.26; 89.9/2.6) for controls and paraplegics, without and with AFOs, respectively. Differences are shown for the controls as well as between paraplegic groups. Ankle joints kinematics displayed no significant changes. However, the ankle dorsiflexion, in the support phase, for controls and paraplegics with AFO was higher than expected (10.97/5.67; 15.48/8.08). Kinetic values were: maximum hip extensor moments (Nm/kg) of 1.84/0.48; 3.36/5.79; 1.45/0.59; 1.58/0.41 a
nd maximum knee extensor moments of 3.53/0.52; 3.04/0.87; 1.44/1.37; 1.24/0.78. Conclusion: Within the paraplegic groups, through spatiotemporal results, gait with AFO was more effective. Nevertheless, the AFO allowed more ankle mobility than expected. Furthermore, lower limb loading, i.e. hip and knee moments generated during NMES+AFO paraplegic gait allows for bone mass increase.
(More)