On the development of an adaptive gait characterizer

Abstract

The study of human gait remains one of the most sought after areas of bio-mechanics. Gait study not only allows us to relate to the degree of impairment carried by a person but also helps us understand the e ect that a particular disease has on his bearing capabilities. Rehabilitation has been closely linked to robotics since long and researchers have been trying to develop gait characterization systems to draw maximum information about the general health of a subject using various methods of gait study. Commonly available gait characterization systems provide information regarding speed, cadence, and calories burnt during an exercise session. However, the gait of an individual changes continuously with every step. Thus, there arose a need to develop a system which enables real time analysis of critical spatio-temporal gait parameters while adapting to the walking pattern of the subject. The study of these parameters for a given subject enables us to perform an analysis of individualized gait pattern thereby allowing us to develop corrective measures for gait de cits. In this work we present a real-time analysis of intra-limb and inter limb temporal parameters using the proposed system/s that adapt to the changing walking speed. Over the course of time, advances in technology has allowed us to build e cient and complicated systems with ease. Hence, it is indeed a great time to be in the eld of designing systems aimed at aiding the needful. Our attempt resulted in a system that was able to adapt to the walking pattern while detecting gait events. Improvements to the system over the course of study allowed us to obtain reliable results that were validated against a gold standard.