Principal Characteristics of Affected and Unaffected Side Trunk Movement and Gait Event Parameters during Hemiplegic Stroke Gait with IMU Sensor

Jeong-Woo Seo,Seul-Gee Kim,Boncho Ku,Joong Il Kim,Jaeuk U Kim,Sangkwan Lee,Kahye Kim

doi:10.3390/s20247338

Abstract

This study describe the characteristics of hemiplegic stroke gait with principal component analysis (PCA) of trunk movement (TM) and gait event (GE) parameters by the inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensors: (1) Background: This process can determine dominant variables through multivariate examination to identify the affected, unaffected, and healthy lower-limb sides; (2) Methods: The study monitored forty patients with stroke and twenty-eight healthy individuals comprising the control group for comparison. The IMU sensors were attached to each subject while performing a 6 m walking test. Sixteen variables extracted from the measured data were divided into 7 GE and 9 TM variables explaining pelvis tilt, oblique, and rotation. (3) Results: The tilt range variables of the trunk movement on the affected and unaffected sides were lower than those of the healthy side; this showed between-group differences in various GE variables. For the healthy and affected sides, 80% of variances were explained with 2 or 3 PCs involving only a few dominant variables; and (4) Conclusions: The difference between each side leg should be considered during the development of a diagnosis method. This research can be utilized to develop functional assessment tools for personalized treatment and to design appropriate training protocols.

Highlights

A hemorrhage or thrombus affects arterial supply to the brain, leading to a stroke; this is followed by neurological impairments such as damage in motor cells and pathways.degradation or loss of motor functions occurs
Comparison of results showed that the tilt range of the trunk movement on the affected and unaffected sides was significantly lower than that on the healthy side
The gait cycle duration was low on the healthy side, double support duration on the affected side was lower than that on the healthy side, and single support duration on the unaffected and healthy sides was higher than that on the affected side

Summary

Introduction

A hemorrhage or thrombus affects arterial supply to the brain, leading to a stroke; this is followed by neurological impairments such as damage in motor cells and pathways.degradation or loss of motor functions occurs. Control problems in the central nervous system decrease muscle strength and generate spasms. The main reason for spasms is voluntary muscle contractions of abnormal magnitude in any muscle group. Functional gait assessment, dynamic gait index, and timed up and go tests are used for gait evaluation [3,4,5]. The results of these tests are indicators of the level of walking impairment when walking while performing a simple task. Various variables are used as parameters for gait evaluation, including time variables associated with conventional tasks, owing to Sensors 2020, 20, 7338; doi:10.3390/s20247338 www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors

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