DEVELOPING A FOOTSWITCH DEVICE TO ASSESS THE LIKELIHOOD OF FALLS IN AT-RISK POPULATIONS

Falls are one of the major cause of injuries, reduced functioning and even mortality in older adults. Most of the falls occur during walking, so considering the mechanics of gait during walking can provide insight to identify the risk of fall in this population. A component of walking mechanics associated with falling in the elderly is gait variability (i.e. the inherent natural fluctuations between strides). Healthy states are associated with an optimal level of movement variability reflecting the adaptability of the underlying control system, while pathological gait can be either too regular, or periodic, or too random and disordered. In this study we aim to develop a footswitch device including a programmed microprocessor electronic board and insoles with pressure sensors to measure gait variability and evaluate fall risk in at-risk populations (e.g. the elderly). For this purpose, we are going to recruit twenty healthy older adults and ten elderly who experienced a fall. Then, participants will be asked to perform three clinical functional tests including 1) timed up and go, 2) Berg Balance scale, and 3) dynamic gait index test. Moreover, they’ll be asked to walk on a treadmill for 10 minutes at 0.8 m.s-1 with foot switch prototype. Stride interval time series will be extracted from the foot switch data and gait variability will be assessed using nonlinear methods. Finding association between the gait variability results and the clinical functional tests can inform about ways to determine the risk of falling with more accurate and inexpensive gait assessments