Technical validation of a body-weight controlled clutch for ankle-foot orthoses of children with cerebral palsy

• van Hoorn, Marleen ^[1] ; Hekman, Edsko ^[1] ; Rocón, Eduardo ^[2] ; van Asseldonk, Edwin H.F. ^[1] ; Bayón, Cristina ^[1]
  1. [1] University of Twente

     University of Twente

     Países Bajos

     
  2. [2] Centro de Automática y Robótica

     Centro de Automática y Robótica

     Madrid, España

     
• Localización: XLIII Jornadas de Automática: libro de actas: 7, 8 y 9 de septiembre de 2022, Logroño (La Rioja) / coord. por Carlos Balaguer Bernaldo de Quirós, José Manuel Andújar Márquez, Ramón Costa Castelló, C. Ocampo-Martínez, Juan Jesús Fernández Lozano, Matilde Santos Peñas, José Simó, Montserrat Gil Martínez, José Luis Calvo-Rolle, Raúl Marín, Eduardo Rocón de Lima, Elisabet Estévez Estévez, Pedro Jesús Cabrera Santana, David Muñoz de la Peña Sequedo, José Luis Guzmán Sánchez, José Luis Pitarch Pérez, Óscar Reinoso García, Óscar Déniz Suárez, Emilio Jiménez Macías, Vanesa Loureiro-Vázquez, 2022, ISBN 978-84-9749-841-8, págs. 165-170
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Ankle-foot orthoses (AFOs) greatly improve gait in patients with Cerebral Palsy (CP). Some AFO designs allow for passive push-off support, however, these often limit the ankle’s ROM during the swing phase of gait. This contribution presents the technical validation of a body-weight controlled clutch (BWC) designed for children with CP, to passively engage and disengage the push-off support without restricting ankle kinematics. We determined the friction coefficient (μ) of different BWC prototypes, and used it as an indicator for the amount off force that can be exerted on the mechanism before slippage occurs. Four clutch configurations were tested, containing a rigid or flexible spacer and a nylon strapping webbing or neoprene rubber slider. The best tested configuration was the one composed by the rigid spacer–nylon slider combination, which yielded a μ as high as 0.98. We envision that a lightweight solution like the BWC presented here can benefit new AFO designs to support push-off on children with gait deficiencies.