Gait Analysis at Multiple Speeds Reveals Differential Functional and Structural Outcomes in Response to Graded Spinal Cord Injury

Spinal cord injury (SCI) patients suffer from diverse gait deficits depending on the severity of their injury. Gait assessments can objectively track the progress during rehabilitation and support clinical decision making, but a comprehensive gait analysis requires far more complex setups and time-consuming protocols that are not feasible in the daily clinical routine. As using inertial sensors for mobile gait analysis has started to gain ground, this work aimed to develop a sensor-based gait analysis for the specific population of SCI patients that measures the spatio-temporal parameters of typical gait laboratories for day-to-day clinical applications. The proposed algorithm uses shank-mounted inertial sensors and personalized thresholds to detect steps and gait events according to the individual gait profiles. The method was validated in nine SCI patients and 17 healthy controls walking on an instrumented treadmill while wearing reflective markers for motion capture used as a gold standard. The sensor-based algorithm (i) performed similarly well for the two cohorts and (ii) is robust enough to cover the diverse gait deficits of SCI patients, from slow (0.3 m/s) to preferred walking speeds.

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The Importance of Gait Analysis in Incomplete Spinal Cord Injury Patients in Field of Neurorehabilitation

Converging Clinical and Engineering Research on Neurorehabilitation - Biosystems & Biorobotics ◽

10.1007/978-3-642-34546-3_109 ◽

2013 ◽

pp. 673-677

Author(s):

Soraya Pérez-Nombela ◽

Antonio José del Ama-Espinosa ◽

Ana de los Reyes-Guzmán ◽

Ángel Gil-Agudo ◽

Francisco Molina-Rueda ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Spinal Cord ◽

Spinal Cord Injury ◽

Gait Analysis ◽

Incomplete Spinal Cord Injury ◽

Cord Injury

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Development of a Novel Gait Analysis Tool Measuring Center of Pressure for Evaluation of Canine Chronic Thoracolumbar Spinal Cord Injury

Journal of Neurotrauma ◽

10.1089/neu.2019.6479 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 36 (21) ◽

pp. 3018-3025 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Melissa J. Lewis ◽

Kimberly D. Williams ◽

Taylor Langley ◽

Leighanne M. Jarvis ◽

Gregory S. Sawicki ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Spinal Cord ◽

Spinal Cord Injury ◽

Gait Analysis ◽

Center Of Pressure ◽

Analysis Tool ◽

Cord Injury

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The CatWalk XT® Gait Analysis Is Closely Correlated with Tissue Damage after Cervical Spinal Cord Injury in Rats

Applied Sciences ◽

10.3390/app11094097 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 11 (9) ◽

pp. 4097

Author(s):

Guoli Zheng ◽

Alexander Younsi ◽

Moritz Scherer ◽

Lennart Riemann ◽

Johannes Walter ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Spinal Cord ◽

Spinal Cord Injury ◽

Gait Analysis ◽

Tissue Damage ◽

Wistar Rats ◽

Spontaneous Recovery ◽

Cervical Spinal Cord ◽

Spinal Cord Tissue ◽

Cord Injury ◽

Consistent Assessment

Objective and consistent assessment of locomotion recovery remains challenging in rodent spinal cord injury (SCI). We, therefore, studied the validity and relevance of the CatWalk XT® gait analysis as a tool for assessing functional outcome in a clinically relevant cervical SCI model in rats. In total, 20 Wistar rats were randomly assigned to either a C6 clip compression/contusion SCI or a sham laminectomy. Locomotion recovery was assessed weekly using the CatWalk XT® gait analysis and the BBB open field score. Six weeks after SCI, the percentage of preserved spinal cord tissue was measured by glial fibrillary acidic protein (GFAP) immunohistochemistry (IHC) staining. Statistical analyses were performed to assess the correlation of the BBB and the percentage of preserved tissue with 30 different CatWalk XT® parameters. SCI caused a bilateral and significant functional impairment in all studied CatWalk XT® parameters. Similar to the BBB, a significant spontaneous recovery could be observed in most of the CatWalk XT® parameters in the following weeks. Correlation between the hindlimb CatWalk XT® parameters and the BBB was good (53% of r values > 0.6) while the correlation between the forelimb and the hindlimb CatWalk XT® parameters and the percentage of preserved tissue was even stronger (83% of r values > 0.6). The CatWalk XT® gait analysis is closely correlated with tissue damage after cervical contusion/compression SCI and can be used as an objective and consistent tool for assessing locomotion recovery.

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