Klodd Elizabeth, Hansen Andrew, Fatone Stefania, Edwards Mark
Liberating Technologies Incorporated, Holliston, MA, USA.
J Rehabil Res Dev. 2010;47(6):543-52. doi: 10.1682/jrrd.2010.01.0003.
The investigators conducted a double-blind randomized crossover study to determine the effects of prosthetic foot forefoot flexibility on oxygen cost and subjective preference rankings of 13 unilateral transtibial prosthesis users. Five experimental feet were fabricated for use in the study: F1, F2, F3, F4, and F5. F1 was most flexible, F5 was least flexible, and F3 was designed to conform to a biomimetic ankle-foot roll-over shape. The experimental feet were modeled after the Shape&Roll prosthetic foot (originally produced by Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois; now in public domain) but had different numbers of saw cuts within the forefoot members, allowing more or less flexibility during walking. Participants walked at the same comfortable, freely selected speed on the treadmill for 7 min with each foot while energy expenditure was measured. No significant difference was found in oxygen cost (mL O(2)/kg/m) between the different feet (p = 0.17), and the order of use was also not significant (p = 0.94). However, the preference ranking was significantly affected by the flexibility of the feet (p = 0.002), with the most flexible foot (F1) ranking significantly poorer than feet F3 (p = 0.003) and F4 (p = 0.004). Users may prefer prosthetic feet that match the flexibility of an intact ankle-foot system, even though we did not detect an energetic benefit at freely selected speeds.
研究人员进行了一项双盲随机交叉研究，以确定假足前足灵活性对13名单侧经胫骨截肢假肢使用者的氧气消耗和主观偏好排名的影响。为该研究制作了5只实验用脚：F1、F2、F3、F4和F5。F1最灵活，F5最不灵活，F3设计成符合仿生踝足翻转形状。实验用脚以Shape&Roll假足（最初由伊利诺伊州芝加哥西北大学生产；现属公共领域）为模型，但在前足部件内有不同数量的锯切，在行走过程中允许或多或少的灵活性。参与者在跑步机上以相同舒适、自由选择的速度用每只脚行走7分钟，同时测量能量消耗。不同的脚在氧气消耗（mL O(2)/kg/m）方面没有发现显著差异（p = 0.17），使用顺序也不显著（p = 0.94）。然而，偏好排名受到脚的灵活性的显著影响（p = 0.002），最灵活的脚（F1）的排名明显比F3脚（p = 0.003）和F4脚（p = 0.004）差。使用者可能更喜欢与完整踝足系统灵活性相匹配的假足，尽管我们在自由选择的速度下未检测到能量效益。
