A team of researchers investigated the center of pressure (COP) during walking among people with unilateral transfemoral amputation (UTFA) across eight walking speeds on a split-belt force-instrumented treadmill. The researchers noted that gait assessment for this population is “indispensable not only for providing quantitative information to help prevent injuries and prescription of treatments, but also for monitoring rehabilitation progress with prosthetic variation.” The researchers concluded that calculating COP trajectories during walking would enable markerless, unconstrained, and time-efficient gait assessments in clinical practice.
Asymmetry and variability parameters were compared based on the COP trajectories of 25 people with UTFA (trauma, sarcoma, cancer, and congenital causes) and 25 able-bodied controls. The individuals with UTFA used their habitual mechanical or microprocessor-controlled prosthetic knees and mechanical feet.
The researchers found that the UTFA COP trajectories were significantly larger in lateral asymmetry and variability but did not show significant differences in anterior-posterior variability compared with those of the able-bodied controls. The individuals with UTFA also demonstrated larger lateral asymmetry at lower speeds.
The results suggested to the researchers that individuals with UTFA adopt orientation-specific balance control strategies during gait and they could also be exposed to a higher risk of falling at lower walk speeds.
The open-access study, “Centre of pressure during walking after unilateral transfemoral amputation,” was published in Scientific Reports.
