Use of a video time display in determining general gait measures

By superimposing a video time display (VTD) onto videotapes of patients walking, and using pause-motion replay, precise measures of walking speed, cadence and stride length may be obtained. Five groups of 10 subjects were used to investigate VTD-based gait analysis under different test conditions. An additional 20 healthy subjects were retested on two occasions on average 10.2 weeks apart. These subjects demonstrated moderate reliability for cadence and poor reliability for speed and stride length. It is recommended that progress be assessed by serial testing with regular time intervals. The results from healthy subjects were comparable with results from studies using other instruments. VTD-based gait analysis is a simple, accurate and inexpensive test procedure under a variety of clinical conditions.