Neuromechanics

Types of Instrumented Gait Analysis

Via 3D instrumented gait analysis helps to increase our understanding of your gait and the stresses on the feet, joints and back as well as moments of instability. Instrumented gait analysis is an objective and valuable tool in clinical practice for the diagnosis, assessment, and management of patients affected by conditions that alter their gait. We also use instrumented gait analysis to plan and evaluate the effectiveness of treatments such as foot orthoses and to explore the consequences of pathologies related to gait, like neuropathy.

Kinematic data refers to the characterization of movement using the geometric description of bodies or segments over time. It encompasses linear and angular kinematics, respectively characterizing trajectories and angular position of body segments from one to another over time. In order to make mathematical analysis easier, patient body’s representation is simplified to a series of rigid bodies or segments moving in 3D (6 degrees of movement) from one to another. The clinical meanings of the data recorded are the following: motion of anatomical joints across the different planes (sagittal, horizontal and frontal) at the foot, ankle, knee and hip level. Cadence, walking speed, duration of stance phase, step length and size of the sustentation polygon are also part of kinematic data. Kinematic data can be particularly useful to link changes in motion with underlying forces and physiological events during gait, for example, heel strike and ankle dorsiflexion angle. It can also be used to characterize overall gait parameters such as mean walking velocity for comparison between healthy and pathological subjects

Kinetic data describe forces and moments applied on the patient while walking such as the ground force reaction (GRF), the joint muscle forces and moments and the discrete pressure analysis of patient’s feet during stance phase. From each reaction studied, different values with clinical meaning can be isolated. For example, while undertaking “pressure measurement”, features such as the peak pressure (PP) applied on the foot during stance phase, the time during the peak pressure is applied called pressure time integral (PTI) and the motion of the center of pressure (instantaneous point of application of the GRF vertical component) can show “typical” patterns related to a known condition. Another example is the combination of kinetic, kinematic and anthropometric data which allows calculation of joint moments and powers (often called “inverse dynamics”), which can result increased in conditions such as osteoarthritis. This process involves calculations often called “inverse dynamics” which refers to the separation of the body in multiple segments and the treatment of each one of them as a free body, with multiple forces acting on them such as gravity, GRF, muscle and ligaments forces

Neuromechanics combines the study of biomechanics and neurophysiology to study human movement examining the combined roles of the skeletal, muscular, and nervous systems and their reactions required to produce the motion.
Muscle signals stimulated by neurological impulses are collected using electromyography (EMG). These muscle signals are indicative of neural activity. In certain instances, EMG data can be indicative of neuroplasticity and learning of motor tasks. The muscular system, specifically skeletal muscle, creates movement around bone joints, and the central nervous system is imperative in directing skeletal muscles in motor movements. By simultaneously collecting the neurologic and biomechanic data, we gain a broader understanding of pathology of motion.