Effect of Ankle-Foot Orthosis on Paretic Gastrocnemius and Tibialis Anterior Muscle Contraction of Stroke Survivors During Walking: A Pilot Study.

Ankle-foot orthoses (AFOs) have been commonly prescribed for stroke survivors with foot drop, but their impact on the contractions of paretic tibialis anterior (TA) and medial gastrocnemius (MG) has remained inconclusive. This study thus investigated the effect of AFOs on these muscle contractions in stroke survivors. The contractions of paretic TA and MG muscles were assessed in twenty stroke patients and compared between walking with and without AFOs, using a novel wearable dynamic ultrasound imaging and sensing system.

A comprehensive benchmarking of a U-Net based model for midbrain auto-segmentation on transcranial sonography.

Background And Objective: Transcranial sonography-based grading of Parkinson's Disease has gained increasing attention in recent years, and it is currently used for assistive differential diagnosis in some specialized centers. To this end, accurate midbrain segmentation is considered an important initial step. However, current practice is manual, time-consuming, and bias-prone due to the subjective nature.

Body posture can modulate liver stiffness measured by transient elastography: a prospective observational study.

Background: Non-invasive measurement of liver stiffness (LS), traditionally performed in the supine position, has been established to assess liver fibrosis. However, fibrosis degree is not the sole determinant of LS, necessitating the identification of relevant confounders. One often-overlooked factor is body posture, and it remains unclear whether normal daily postures interfere with LS irrespective of fibrosis.

Automatic Transcranial Sonography-Based Classification of Parkinson's Disease Using a Novel Dual-Channel CNXV2-DANet.

Transcranial sonography (TCS) has been introduced to assess hyper-echogenicity in the substantia nigra of the midbrain for Parkinson's disease (PD); however, its subjective and resource-demanding nature has impeded its widespread application. An AI-empowered TCS-based PD classification tool is greatly demanding, yet relevant research is severely scarce. Therefore, we proposed a novel dual-channel CNXV2-DANet for TCS-based PD classification using a large cohort.

Transcutaneous Electrical Spinal Cord Stimulation Increased Target-Specific Muscle Strength and Locomotion in Chronic Spinal Cord Injury.

Background: The recovery of locomotion is greatly prioritized, and neuromodulation has been emerging as a promising approach in recent times.

Study Design: Single-subject research design.

Settings: A laboratory at The Hong Kong Polytechnic University.

Using Sequence Analyses to Quantitatively Measure Oropharyngeal Swallowing Temporality in Point-of-Care Ultrasound Examinations: A Pilot Study.

(1) : Swallowing is a complex process that comprises well-timed control of oropharyngeal and laryngeal structures to achieve airway protection and swallowing efficiency. To understand its temporality, previous research adopted adherence measures and revealed obligatory pairs in healthy swallows and the effect of aging and bolus type on the variability of event timing and order. This study aimed to (i) propose a systemic conceptualization of swallowing physiology, (ii) apply sequence analyses, a set of information-theoretic and bioinformatic methods, to quantify and characterize swallowing temporality, and (iii) investigate the effect of aging and dysphagia on the quantified variables using sequence analyses measures.

Effects of non-invasive cervical spinal cord neuromodulation by trans-spinal electrical stimulation on cortico-muscular descending patterns in upper extremity of chronic stroke.

Trans-spinal electrical stimulation (tsES) to the intact spinal cord poststroke may modulate the cortico-muscular control in stroke survivors with diverse lesions in the brain. This work aimed to investigate the immediate effects of tsES on the cortico-muscular descending patterns during voluntary upper extremity (UE) muscle contractions by analyzing cortico-muscular coherence (CMCoh) and electromyography (EMG) in people with chronic stroke. Twelve chronic stroke participants were recruited to perform wrist-hand extension and flexion tasks at submaximal levels of voluntary contraction for the corresponding agonist flexors and extensors.

Landmark Localization From Medical Images With Generative Distribution Prior.

In medical image analysis, anatomical landmarks usually contain strong prior knowledge of their structural information. In this paper, we propose to promote medical landmark localization by modeling the underlying landmark distribution via normalizing flows. Specifically, we introduce the flow-based landmark distribution prior as a learnable objective function into a regression-based landmark localization framework.

Reliability, Validity, and Identification Ability of a Commercialized Waist-Attached Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) Sensor-Based System in Fall Risk Assessment of Older People.

Falls are a prevalent cause of injury among older people. While some wearable inertial measurement unit (IMU) sensor-based systems have been widely investigated for fall risk assessment, their reliability, validity, and identification ability in community-dwelling older people remain unclear. Therefore, this study evaluated the performance of a commercially available IMU sensor-based fall risk assessment system among 20 community-dwelling older recurrent fallers (with a history of ≥2 falls in the past 12 months) and 20 community-dwelling older non-fallers (no history of falls in the past 12 months), together with applying the clinical scale of the Mini-Balance Evaluation Systems Test (Mini-BESTest).

Restoration of Over-Ground Walking via Non-Invasive Neuromodulation Therapy: A Single-Case Study.

Spinal cord injuries (SCI) can result in sensory and motor dysfunctions, which were long considered permanent. Recent advancement in electrical neuromodulation has been proven to restore sensorimotor function in people with SCI. These stimulation protocols, however, were mostly invasive, expensive, and difficult to implement.

Associations between paraspinal muscle characteristics and spinal curvature in conservatively treated adolescent idiopathic scoliosis: a systematic review.

Background Context: Children with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) may show asymmetrical paraspinal muscle characteristics.

Purpose: To summarize the evidence regarding: (1) the associations between various paraspinal muscle characteristics and spinal curvature; (2) whether paraspinal muscle properties significantly differed between children with and without AIS; and (3) whether baseline paraspinal muscle characteristics predicted curve progression.

Study Design/setting: Systematic literature review.

Three-dimensional ultrasonography could be a potential non-ionizing tool to evaluate vertebral rotation of subjects with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis.

Background: Three-dimensional (3D) ultrasonography is nonionizing and has been demonstrated to be a reliable tool for scoliosis assessment, including coronal and sagittal curvatures. It shows a great potential for axial vertebral rotation (AVR) evaluation, yet its validity and reliability need to be further demonstrated.

Materials And Methods: Twenty patients with adolescent idiopathic scoliosis (AIS) (coronal Cobb: 26.

Reliability and validity of assessing lower-limb muscle architecture of patients with cerebral palsy (CP) using ultrasound: A systematic review.

Aims: To investigate the reliability, validity, and level of evidence of applying ultrasound in assessing the lower-limb muscles of patients with cerebral palsy (CP).

Method: Publications in Medline, PubMed, Web of Science, and Embase were searched on May 10, 2023, to identify and examine relevant studies investigating the reliability/validity of ultrasound in evaluating the architecture of CP lower-limb muscles systematically, following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis 2020 guidelines.

Results: Out of 897 records, 9 publications with 111 CP participants aged 3.

Sagittal Spinal Alignment in People with Chronic Spinal Cord Injury and Normal Individual: A Comparison Study Using 3D Ultrasound Imaging.

The aim of this study was to compare the sagittal spinal alignment of people with chronic spinal cord injury (SCI) with normal individuals and to determine whether transcutaneous electrical spinal cord stimulation (TSCS) could cause a change in the thoracic kyphosis (TK) and lumbar lordosis (LL) to re-establish normal sagittal spinal alignment. A case series study was conducted, wherein twelve individuals with SCI and ten neurologically intact subjects were scanned using 3D ultrasonography. In addition, three people with SCI having complete tetraplegia participated further to receive a 12-week treatment (TSCS with task-specific rehabilitation) after evaluation of sagittal spinal profile.

Neuromodulation for recovery of trunk and sitting functions following spinal cord injury: a comprehensive review of the literature.

Trunk stability is crucial for people with trunk paralysis resulting from spinal cord injuries (SCI), as it plays a significant role in performing daily life activities and preventing from fall-related accidents. Traditional therapy used assistive methods or seating modifications to provide passive assistance while restricting their daily functionality. The recent emergence of neuromodulation techniques has been reported as an alternative therapy that could improve trunk and sitting functions following SCI.

Automatic 3-D spine curve measurement in freehand ultrasound via structure-aware reinforcement learning spinous process localization.

Freehand 3-D ultrasound systems have been advanced in scoliosis assessment to avoid radiation hazards, especially for teenagers. This novel 3-D imaging method also makes it possible to evaluate the spine curvature automatically from the corresponding 3-D projection images. However, most approaches neglect the three-dimensional spine deformity by only using the rendering images, thus limiting their usage in clinical applications.

Controlling Upper Limb Prostheses Using Sonomyography (SMG): A Review.

This paper presents a critical review and comparison of the results of recently published studies in the fields of human-machine interface and the use of sonomyography (SMG) for the control of upper limb prothesis. For this review paper, a combination of the keywords "Human Machine Interface", "Sonomyography", "Ultrasound", "Upper Limb Prosthesis", "Artificial Intelligence", and "Non-Invasive Sensors" was used to search for articles on Google Scholar and PubMed. Sixty-one articles were found, of which fifty-nine were used in this review.

Combined Transcutaneous Electrical Spinal Cord Stimulation and Task-Specific Rehabilitation Improves Trunk and Sitting Functions in People with Chronic Tetraplegia.

The aim of this study was to examine the effects of transcutaneous electrical spinal cord stimulation (TSCS) and conventional task-specific rehabilitation (TSR) on trunk control and sitting stability in people with chronic tetraplegia secondary to a spinal cord injury (SCI). Five individuals with complete cervical (C4-C7) cord injury participated in 24-week therapy that combined TSCS and TSR in the first 12 weeks, followed by TSR alone for another 12 weeks. The TSCS was delivered simultaneously at T11 and L1 spinal levels, at a frequency ranging from 20-30 Hz with 0.

Success Rate of Transcranial Doppler Scanning of Cerebral Arteries at Different Transtemporal Windows in Healthy Elderly Individuals.

This study measured the rates of success in applying transcranial Doppler (TCD) scanning at the middle, posterior and anterior temporal windows (MTW, PTW and ATW) in the elderly. A hand-held 1.6-MHz pulsed-wave TCD transducer was used to search for cerebral arteries at MTW, PTW and ATW locations.

Brain-Computer Interface Priming for Cervical Transcutaneous Spinal Cord Stimulation Therapy: An Exploratory Case Study.

Loss of arm and hand function is one of the most devastating consequences of cervical spinal cord injury (SCI). Although some residual functional neurons often pass the site of injury, recovery after SCI is extremely limited. Recent efforts have aimed to augment traditional rehabilitation by combining exercise-based training with techniques such as transcutaneous spinal cord stimulation (tSCS), and movement priming.