Gait waveform analysis tools: application to knee osteoarthritis

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Osteoarthritis (OA) occurs worldwide, and is probably the most common rheumatic condition that causes disability. Mechanical factors that are important to OA include abnormal loading of joints due to oddities of limb alignment and/or previous injury, unusual patterns of gait, obesity, or excessive demands made on joints. Gait analysis is the only means currently available to measure joint motion and forces during activities of daily living. The challenge has been the distilling of clinically relevant information from the gait data. A new approach, based on pattern recognition techniques, has been described by the applicant that overcomes the highly complex, nature of gait waveform data, while maintaining the salient information in the waveform data. This research proposal builds upon this work through the development of additional analytical tools for gait analysis of patients with knee joint OA. Some of these tools are for the extension of these pattern recognition techniques, while others are to provide the means to obtain better estimates of the joint contact forces during activities of daily living. These estimates will allow us to better understand the causes of knee arthritis so that we can improve treatments for this disease.