Functional electrical stimulation in adult patients with cerebral palsy and foot drop-outcome in gait.

Background: Foot drop is a common condition for patients with upper motor neuron syndrome such as cerebral palsy (CP). This study aimed to investigate the effects of functional electrical stimulation (FES) on gait function, quality of life, and FES satisfaction in adults with CP and foot drop. To analyze effects over time, an observational, longitudinal study was performed.

Pain After Lower Limb Amputations: Insights from the Heidelberg Amputation Registry.

: The experience of unpleasant sensory phenomena after lower limb amputations (LLAs), including phantom limb pain (PLP), phantom limb sensation (PLS), and residual limb pain (RLP), impacts global healthcare and adversely affects outcomes post-amputation. This study aimed to describe the distribution of PLP, PLS, and RLP among patients with LLAs registered in the Heidelberg Amputation Registry. The primary objective was to determine the prevalence of sensory abnormalities across different amputation levels and causes.

How to reduce the carbon footprint of the agricultural sector? Factors influencing farmers' decision to participate in carbon sequestration programs.

Mitigating climate change by sequestering carbon in agricultural soils through humus formation is a crucial component of sustainable agriculture. Humus programs that are designed to incentivize farmers to build more humus are still recent innovations, so current knowledge about farmers' motivation to participate is limited. This study examines the adoption of non-governmental humus programs to promote carbon sequestration by analyzing farmers' willingness to participate in humus programs and influential factors.

Farmers' Willingness to Participate in a Carbon Sequestration Program - A Discrete Choice Experiment.

Farmers can counteract global warming by drawing carbon dioxide from the air into agricultural soils by building up humus. Humus programs were developed to motivate farmers for even more humus formation (= carbon sequestration) through an additional financial incentive. These programs are still at an early stage of development, which is why the number of participating farmers and research work is still low.

RGD-coated polymeric microbubbles promote ultrasound-mediated drug delivery in an inflamed endothelium-pericyte co-culture model of the blood-brain barrier.

Drug delivery to central nervous pathologies is compromised by the blood-brain barrier (BBB). A clinically explored strategy to promote drug delivery across the BBB is sonopermeation, which relies on the combined use of ultrasound (US) and microbubbles (MB) to induce temporally and spatially controlled opening of the BBB. We developed an advanced in vitro BBB model to study the impact of sonopermeation on the delivery of the prototypic polymeric drug carrier pHPMA as a larger molecule and the small molecule antiviral drug ribavirin.

[Motion analysis in lower limb exoprosthetics-possibilities and limitations].

Background: Gait analysis is of high relevance in prosthetics as it is an essential part of the fitting process. The documentation of movement by means of videos and instrumented methods is becoming increasingly important in prosthetics as benefits of a complex prosthesis can best be shown by structured observation.

Procedure: A movement analysis should always be preceded by an anamnesis and clinical examination in order to detect functional limitations of the examined person and thus to establish correlations to gait deviations.

Varus Knee Limits Pain Relief Effects of Laterally Wedged Insoles and Ankle-Foot Orthoses in Medial Knee Osteoarthritis.

Objective: To investigate the impact of varus malalignment of the knee on pain reduction achieved by an ankle-foot orthosis and a laterally wedged insole in patients with medial knee osteoarthritis.

Design: Secondary analysis of a randomized, clinically prospective cross-over study.

Patients: Twenty-eight participants with medial knee osteoarthritis.

Hindfoot Flexibility Influences the Biomechanical Effects of Laterally Wedged Insoles and Ankle-Foot Orthoses in Medial Knee Osteoarthritis.

Objective: To investigate the relationship of frontal plane ankle mobility with the effects of an ankle-foot orthosis (AFO) and a laterally wedged insole (LWI) on knee adduction moment (KAM) in the treatment of medial knee osteoarthritis.

Design: Randomized, nonblinded crossover trial.

Setting: Outpatient clinic of university hospital.

A comparison between laterally wedged insoles and ankle-foot orthoses for the treatment of medial osteoarthritis of the knee: A randomized cross-over trial.

Objective: To compare biomechanical and clinical outcome of laterally wedged insoles (LWI) and an ankle-foot orthosis (AFO) in patients with medial knee osteoarthritis.

Design: Single-centre, block-randomized, cross-over controlled trial.

Setting: Outpatient clinic.

The influence of hip muscle strength on gait in individuals with a unilateral transfemoral amputation.

Introduction: A unilateral transfemoral amputation (TFA) has a major impact on function. A leg-length discrepancy is the primary structural change, accompanied by the loss of lower-limb muscle volume and function. Prostheses can help individuals with a TFA to regain function, but such individuals still do not reach the functional level of unimpaired peers and exhibit gait deviations.

Benefits of an increased prosthetic ankle range of motion for individuals with a trans-tibial amputation walking with a new prosthetic foot.

Background: Individuals with trans-tibial amputation show a greater peak prosthetic ankle power (push- off) when using energy storing and returning (ESAR) prosthetic feet as compared to solid-ankle cushion-heel feet. ESAR feet further contribute to the users' body support and thus limit prosthetic ankle motion. To improve ankle motion, articulating prosthetic feet have been introduced.

Knee-ankle-foot orthosis with powered knee for support in the elderly.

A prototype of a powered knee orthotic device was developed to determine whether fractional external torque and power support to the knee relieves the biomechanical loads and reduces the muscular demand for a subject performing sit-to-stand movements. With this demonstrator, consisting of the subsystems actuation, kinematics, sensors, and control, all relevant sensor data can be acquired and full control is maintained over actuator parameters. A series-elastic actuator based on a direct current motor provides up to 30 Nm torque to the knee via a hinge joint with an additional sliding degree of freedom.

Functional effects of a prosthetic torsion adapter in trans-tibial amputees during unplanned spin and step turns.

Background: Shear stress at the stump in trans-tibial amputees induced by turning movements may be reduced with the use of torsion adapters in the prosthesis.

Objective: Monitoring the motion and kinetic effects of a regular torsion adapter in comparison to a rigid placebo in unplanned spin and step turns.

Study Design: Single-blinded placebo-controlled cohort study.

Integrating strength tests of amputees within the protocol of conventional clinical gait analysis: a novel approach.

Clinical experience tells us that the lower-limb amputees are one of the patient groups who clearly suffer from a strength deficit in their involved side. However, there is no obvious evidence for the relation between the residual limb strength and walking ability in this population. Correlating the results of the conventional clinical gait analysis (CGA) with strength tests could help to find out how deficits in strength impact the amputees' gait.