Inertial Sensing for Gait Event Detection and Transfemoral Prosthesis Control Strategy

This paper presents a method for walking gait event detection using a single inertial measurement unit (IMU) mounted on the shank.

Experiments were conducted to detect heel strike (HS) and toe off (TO) gait events of 10 healthy subjects and 5 transfemoral amputees walking at various speeds and slopes on an instrumented treadmill. The performance of three different algorithms [thresholding (THR), linear discriminant analysis, and quadratic discriminant analysis] was evaluated on both timing and frequency of gait event detections compared to data collected using force plates.

Though all algorithms could be used reliably (within 8.2% stride temporal error and 0.2% frequency error), THR was the most accurate, detecting 100% of gait events within an average of 2% stride for both the healthy subjects and the amputees. Furthermore, universal parameters could be used across all speeds and slopes within each demographic.

HS and TO for walking gait can be reliably detected in healthy and transfemoral amputee subjects using a single IMU.

This work provides a robust, simple, and inexpensive method of gait event detection that does not rely on a load cell and could be easily implemented in a lower-limb prosthesis.