DEVELOPMENT OF WEARABLE GAIT EVALUATION SYSTEM A Preliminary Test of Measurement of Joint Angles and Stride Length

The purpose of this study is to develop wearable sensor system for gait evaluation using gyroscopes and accelerometers for application to rehabilitation, healthcare and so on. In this paper, simultaneous measurement of joint angles of the lower limbs and stride length was tested with a prototype of wearable sensor system. The system measured the joint angles using the Kalman filter. Signals from the sensor attached on the foot were used in the stride length estimation detecting foot movement automatically. Joint angles of the lower limbs and the stride length were measured with reasonable accuracy compared to those values measured with optical motion measurement system with healthy subjects. Joint angle patterns measured in 10m walking with a healthy subject were similar to common patterns. High correlation between joint angles at some characteristic points and walking speed were also found adequately from measured data. The system was suggested to be able to detect characteristics of gait.