Welcome to the Podiatry Arena forums

You are currently viewing our podiatry forum as a guest which gives you limited access to view all podiatry discussions and access our other features. By joining our free global community of Podiatrists and other interested foot health care professionals you will have access to post podiatry topics (answer and ask questions), communicate privately with other members, upload content, view attachments, receive a weekly email update of new discussions, access other special features. Registered users do not get displayed the advertisements in posted messages. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join our global Podiatry community today!

  1. Have you considered the Clinical Biomechanics Boot Camp Online, for taking it to the next level? See here for more.
    Dismiss Notice
Dismiss Notice
Have you considered the Clinical Biomechanics Boot Camp Online, for taking it to the next level? See here for more.
Dismiss Notice
Have you liked us on Facebook to get our updates? Please do. Click here for our Facebook page.
Dismiss Notice
Do you get the weekly newsletter that Podiatry Arena sends out to update everybody? If not, click here to organise this.

Do we know how the foot really moves during gait?

Discussion in 'Biomechanics, Sports and Foot orthoses' started by JFAR, May 27, 2009.

  1. JFAR

    JFAR Active Member


    Members do not see these Ads. Sign Up.
    Dear colleagues,

    A manuscript based on Professor Chris Nester's keynote lecture at the Australasian Podiatry Conference has been published in JFAR:

    __________________________________

    Lessons from dynamic cadaver and invasive bone pin studies: do we know how the foot really moves during gait?

    Christopher J Nester

    Journal of Foot and Ankle Research 2009, 2:18 (27 May 2009)

    Background
    This paper provides a summary of a Keynote lecture delivered at the 2009 Australasian Podiatry Conference. The aim of the paper is to review recent research that has adopted dynamic cadaver and invasive kinematics research approaches to better understand foot and ankle kinematics during gait. It is not intended to systematically cover all literature related to foot and ankle kinematics (such as research using surface mounted markers). Since the paper is based on a keynote presentation its focuses on the authors own experiences and work in the main, drawing on the work of others where appropriate.

    Methods
    Two approaches to the problem of accessing and measuring the kinematics of individual anatomical structures in the foot have been taken, (i) static and dynamic cadaver models, and (ii) invasive in-vivo research. Cadaver models offer the advantage that there is complete access to all the tissues of the foot, but the cadaver must be manipulated and loaded in a manner which replicates how the foot would have performed when in-vivo. The key value of invasive in-vivo foot kinematics research is the validity of the description of foot kinematics, but the key difficulty is how generalisable this data is to the wider population.

    Results
    Through these techniques a great deal has been learnt. We better understand the valuable contribution mid and forefoot joints make to foot biomechanics, and how the ankle and subtalar joints can have almost comparable roles. Variation between people in foot kinematics is high and normal. This includes variation in how specific joints move and how combinations of joints move. The foot continues to demonstrate its flexibility in enabling us to get from A to B via a large number of different kinematic solutions.

    Conclusions
    Rather than continue to apply a poorly founded model of foot type whose basis is to make all feet meet criteria for the mechanical 'ideal' or 'normal' foot, we should embrace variation between feet and identify it as an opportunity to develop patient-specific clinical models of foot function.

    __________________________________

    Note that there are two movie files available for viewing:

    Dynamic cadaver model: http://www.jfootankleres.com/imedia/3582562252691450/supp1.wmv

    Invasive bone pin study: http://www.jfootankleres.com/imedia/2746218612688409/supp2.wmv
     
Loading...

Share This Page