Liberating Technologies, Holliston, Massachusetts, is collaborating with RxFunction, Eden Prairie, Minnesota, to develop a system leveraging neuroprosthetic technology to perform advanced balance and gait training for those utilizing artificial limbs. Liberating Technologies is the research arm of College Park Industries, now part of Össur Group, Reykjavik, Iceland. The grant for the project, called Optimize Performance and Mitigate Falls in Warfighters with Lower Limb Trauma and/or Loss, is anticipated to be more than one million dollars.
RxFunction received a Small Business Innovation Research Direct Phase II contract from the Department of Defense (DOD) Defense Health Agency to fund development that will incorporate its Walkasins sensory neuroprosthetic technology into artificial limbs for enhanced rehabilitation of gait and balance for active-duty military members, veterans, and civilians with lower limb trauma and/or loss.
Therapists currently lack readily available tools to use in the clinic for advanced balance and gait training to decrease fall risk and increase performance. Future commercial applications would extend the technology into a prosthesis to provide remote patient monitoring capabilities with therapy on an ongoing basis.
