Quantification of Postural Sway during Pediatric Physical Therapy using Wearable Inertial Measurement Units

Young children with movement impairments from early brain injury often exhibit deficits in balance and postural control. Rehabilitation approaches for this population specifically focus on improving postural control but quantifying dose of intervention beyond time spent on an activity is challenging. Force plates and pressure mats are tools typically used to quantify balance, however they have limited utility for regular clinical use. Wearable inertial sensors offer a more cost effective and practical solution to measuring postural control in pediatric populations, but techniques for utilizing data output are still in development. In this paper, we present an analysis method of inertial sensor data used to measure postural sway and show preliminary results highlighting feasibility of detecting changes in postural sway from baseline during physical therapy activities.