An evaluation method of complex movement and dynamic stability of the arm during walking based on gyroscope data

The work introduces a new means for quantification of dynamic stability and upper limb movement as a whole during gait. Swinging arms during gait performed by the experiment volunteers, as a cyclic motion, was quantified using two parameters AH (the convex hull area) and already known to the medical community - ROM (range of motion) revealed a potential use of the former in the scientific community. Looking at the results of the two parameters, even though ROM has shown to seem to be comparably instrumental as it yielded surprisingly rather identical results to the AH parameter (which yielded values of subjects walking at 5 km/h about twofold larger than those in volunteers walking at 3 km/h), it still fails to examine the pair of angles at the same time due to a strong interrelation of the observed joints in volunteers. As complex upper limb movement appears to be rather uniform for both arms, no significant differences between the dominant and non-dominant arm were found. It appears that the novel method using inexpensive gyroscopes is capable of quantifying dynamic stability and periodic movement pattern of the upper limb, therefore a pair of two common gyroscopes or goniometers placed on the patients body may find their place among standard equipment for clinical examinations or in the field of biomechanical measurements. The presented method might possibly also become a part of MoCap systems or in the area of prosthetics in which dynamic stability or movement patterns are key parameters