A Wearable Magneto-Inertial System for Gait Analysis (H-Gait): Validation on Normal Weight and Overweight/Obese Young Healthy Adults

Background: Wearable magneto-inertial sensors are being increasingly used to obtain human motion measurements out of the lab, although their performance in applications requiring high accuracy, such as gait analysis, are still a subject of debate. The aim of this work was to validate a gait analysis system (H-Gait) based on magneto-inertial sensors, both in normal weight (NW) and overweight/obese (OW) subjects. The validation is performed against a reference multichannel recording system (STEP32), providing direct measurements of gait timings (through foot-switches) and joint angles in the sagittal plane (through electrogoniometers). Methods: Twenty-two young male subjects were recruited for the study (12 NW, 10 OW). After positioning body-fixed sensors of both systems, each subject was asked to walk, at a self-selected speed, over a 14-m straight path for 12 trials. Gait signals were recorded, at the same time, with the two systems. Spatio-temporal parameters, ankle, knee, and hip joint kinematics were extracted analyzing an average of 89 ± 13 gait cycles from each lower limb. Intraclass correlation coefficient and Bland-Altmann plots were used to compare H-Gait and STEP32 measurements. Changes in gait parameters and joint kinematics of OW with respect NW were also evaluated. Results: The two systems were highly consistent for cadence, while a lower agreement was found for the other spatio-temporal parameters. Ankle and knee joint kinematics is overall comparable. Joint ROMs values were slightly lower for H-Gait with respect to STEP32 for the ankle (by 1.9° for NW, and 1.6° for OW) and for the knee (by 4.1° for NW, and 1.8° for OW). More evident differences were found for hip joint, with ROMs values higher for H-Gait (by 6.8° for NW, and 9.5° for OW). NW and OW showed significant differences considering STEP32 (p = 0.0004), but not H-Gait (p = 0.06). In particular, overweight/obese subjects showed a higher cadence (55.0 vs. 52.3 strides/min) and a lower hip ROM (23.0° vs. 27.3°) than normal weight subjects. Conclusions: The two systems can be considered interchangeable for what concerns joint kinematics, except for the hip, where discrepancies were evidenced. Differences between normal and overweight/obese subjects were statistically significant using STEP32. The same tendency was observed using H-Gait

Evaluation of the Performances of Two Wearable Systems for Gait Analysis: A Pilot Study

Wearable sensor systems to perform human motion analysis are receiving increasing attention in different application fields. Among wearable sensors, inertial sensors have promising features. However, before they can be employed routinely in clinical applications, it is important to evaluate their reliability. Gait analysis was performed on one male volunteer: data were simultaneously collected with HGait System, based on magnetic and inertial measurement sensor units system, and with STEP32, a commercial electromechanical system already used in clinics. Spatio temporal parameters and joint kinematics in the sagittal plane obtained with H-Gait and STEP32 are compared. The MIMUs system provides a reliable estimation of spatiotemporal parameters, and acceptable hip and knee kinematic curves, while ankle joint measurements must be improved to be clinically useful

Influence of BMI on Gait Characteristics of Young Adults: 3D Evaluation Using Inertial Sensors

Overweight/obesity is a physical condition that affects daily activities, including walking. The main purpose of this study was to identify if there is a relationship between body mass index (BMI) and gait characteristics in young adults. 12 normal weight (NW) and 10 overweight/obese (OW) individuals walked at a self-selected speed along a 14 m indoor path. H-Gait system, combining seven inertial sensors (fixed on pelvis and lower limbs), was used to record gait data. Walking speed, spatio-temporal parameters and joint kinematics in 3D were analyzed. Differences between NW and OWand correlations between BMI and gait parameters were evaluated. Conventional spatio-temporal parameters did not show statistical differences between the two groups or correlations with the BMI. However, significant results were pointed out for the joint kinematics. OW showed greater hip joint angles in frontal and transverse planes, with respect to NW. In the transverse plane, OW showed a greater knee opening angle and a shorter length of knee and ankle trajectories. Correlations were found between BMI and kinematic parameters in the frontal and transverse planes. Despite some phenomena such as soft tissue artifact and kinematics cross-talk, which have to be more deeply assessed, current results show a relationship between BMI and gait characteristics in young adults that should be looked at in osteoarthritis prevention

Wearable Inertial Sensors to Assess Standing Balance: A Systematic Review

Wearable sensors are de facto revolutionizing the assessment of standing balance. The aim of this work is to review the state-of-the-art literature that adopts this new posturographic paradigm, i.e., to analyse human postural sway through inertial sensors directly worn on the subject body. After a systematic search on PubMed and Scopus databases, two raters evaluated the quality of 73 full-text articles, selecting 47 high-quality contributions. A good inter-rater reliability was obtained (Cohen’s kappa = 0.79). This selection of papers was used to summarize the available knowledge on the types of sensors used and their positioning, the data acquisition protocols and the main applications in this field (e.g., “active aging”, biofeedback-based rehabilitation for fall prevention, and the management of Parkinson’s disease and other balance-related pathologies), as well as the most adopted outcome measures. A critical discussion on the validation of wearable systems against gold standards is also presented

Effects of growth on residual stress distribution along the radial depth of cortical cylinders from bovine femurs.

Residual stress is defined as the stress that remains in bone tissue without any external forces. This study investigated the effects of growth on residual stress distributions from the surface to deeper regions of cortical cylinders obtained from less-than-one-month-old (Group Y) and two-year-old (Group M) bovine femurs. In these experiments, five diaphysis specimens from each group were used. Residual stress was measured using a high-energy synchrotron white X-ray beam to penetrate X-rays into the deeper region of the bone specimens. The measurements in the cortical cylinders from Groups Y and M were performed at 0.5- and 1-mm intervals, respectively, from the outer surface to the deeper region of the diaphysis specimens at four positions: anterior, posterior, lateral, and medial. The residual stress was calculated on the basis of variation in the interplanar spacing of hydroxyapatite crystals in the bone tissue. According to the results, the diaphysis specimens from Group Y were not subjected to large residual stresses (average −1.2 MPa and 2.4 MPa at the surface region and 1.5 mm depth, respectively). In Group M, the surface region of the diaphysis specimens was subjected to tensile residual stresses (average 6.7 MPa) and the deeper region was subjected to compressive stresses (average −8.2 MPa at 3 mm depth). There was a strong significant difference between both these regions. The value of residual stresses at the surface region of the diaphysis specimens in both the groups had a positive statistical correlation with the cortical thickness at the measured locations

Residual Stress in Bone Structure and Tissue of Rabbit's Tibiofibula

This paper presents an X-ray diffraction method of measuring the residual stress/strain in bone tissue of rabbit's tibia. To derive the residual stress, bone powder of the diameter less than 40 micrometer was used as a control specimen at non-stressed state. From the X-ray measurements, it was clear that the distribution of residual stress existed in the bone tissue. The tensile residual stress at bone axial direction occurred in the proximal-medial region of rabbit's tibia. The compressive stress occurred in the other regions. In addition, the mechanism to generate the residual stress was investigated by sequential cutting of the tibiofibula system from bone structure scale to bone tissue scale. The remodeling is a phenomenon that the bone structure adapts functionally to mechanical environment. The residual stress will become a mechanical trigger to induce the remodeling

Relationship between bone tissue strain and lattice strain of HAp crystals in bovine cortical bone under tensile loading.

Cortical bone is a composite material composed of hydroxyapatite (HAp) and collagen. As HAp is a crystalline structure, an X-ray diffraction method is available to measure the strain of HAp crystals. However, HAp crystals in bone tissue have been known to have the low degree of crystallization. Authors have proposed an X-ray diffraction method to measure the lattice strain of HAp crystals from the diffusive intensity profile due to low crystallinity. The precision of strain measurement was greatly improved by this method. In order to confirm the possibility of estimating the bone tissue strain with measurements of the strain of HAp crystals, this work investigates the relationship between bone tissue strain on a macroscopic scale and the lattice strain of HAp crystals on a microscopic scale. The X-ray diffraction experiments were performed under tensile loading. Strip bone specimens of 40×6×0.8 mm in size were cut from the cortical region of a shaft of bovine femur. A stepwise tensile load was applied in the longitudinal direction of the specimen. By detecting the diffracted X-ray beam transmitted through the specimen, the lattice strain was directly measured in the loading direction. As a result, the lattice strain of HAp crystals showed lower value than the bone tissue strain measured by a strain gage. The bone tissue strain was described with the mean lattice strain of the HAp crystals and the elastic modulus