Pre- and postoperative gait analysis in patients with spastic diplegia: a preliminary report

The benefits of using computerized gait analysis to plan and evaluate operations were assessed by studying the data from 20 children with spastic diplegia and examining the changes in estimated external work of walking, stride length, walking velocity, and joint rotations pre- and postoperatively. Of the 20 patients, 13 improved, 6 were unchanged, and 1 was worse. None of the patients walked in a crouch postoperatively. By clinical evaluation, 19 of the 20 patients were better. Thus objective gait analysis imposed much more stringent criteria for improvement. Computerized gait analysis has enabled us to be more objective in the evaluation and documentation of outcome.