Real world intelligent monitoring of prosthesis and footwear
(REAL-PROF)
F.C. Schasfoort1 , M. de Niet1, J.B.J. Bussmann1 and C.J. Nester2
1Department of Rehabilitation Medicine, ErasmusMC, Rotterdam,
The Netherlands
2Centre for Rehabilitation and Human Performance Research, University
of Salford, Salford, UK
Real-Prof is an EU funded project which aims to develop technologies
for monitoring lower limb amputees and patients with orthotic footwear.
The main target is to identify tissue deterioration in an amputees
stump or in a patients foot before it progresses too far. The projects
importance is clear because there are some 600.000 prosthesis users and
2.4 million therapeutic footwear users in the EU.
The project delivered pre-commercial prototype systems that can monitor
patients in realtime
everyday life, and transmit data to clinicians. In this way clinical intervention
can occur
as soon as problems start to develop. Sensors are integrated into the
shoe or prosthesis
socket and data communicated to a data storage and communication units
worn of the
waist. The waist worn data communications unit transmits data to remote
clinicians via
secure wireless communication. Prosthesis-system sensors are three accelerometers
and
three pressure strips. Footwear-system sensors are tri-axial insole force
transducers for 8
areas under the foot and one Xsens MT9 sensor for acceleration and angular
velocity.
Advanced data processing tools were developed to enrich and interrogate
data in order to
provide clinical decision support. Methods such as pattern recognition,
statistical analyses,
neural networks and biomechanical modelling were employed to estimate
motions of lower
limbs and forces under the feet, and to determine whether a subject is
walking, sitting or
standing.
This study presents user evaluations of the Real-Prof systems from the
perspectives of actual users: clinicians and patients. Comments and feedback
about hardware and software of the monitoring systems are presented (e.g.
size of components, performance telecommunication unit, power use, doffing
and donning, practical feasibility, cosmetics, data storage, prioritisation
of data enrichment, clinical scenarios of abnormality, warning system).
User evaluation data is critical for further development and domestication
of innovative systems such as Real-Prof.
Paper presented
at Measuring Behavior 2005
, 5th International Conference on Methods and Techniques
in Behavioral Research, 30 August - 2 September 2005, Wageningen, The
Netherlands.
© 2005 Noldus
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