Propagation of the hip joint centre location error to the estimate of femur vs pelvis orientation using a constrained or an unconstrained approach.
To estimate hip joint angles during selected motor tasks using stereophotogrammetric data, it is necessary to determine the hip joint centre position. The question is whether the errors affecting that determination propagate less to the angles estimates when a three degrees of freedom (DOFs) constraint (spherical hinge) is used between femur and pelvis, rather than when the two bones are assumed to be unconstrained (six DOFs). An analytical relationship between the hip joint centre location error and the joint angle error was obtained limited to the planar case. In the 3-D case, a similar relationship was obtained using a simulation approach based on experimental data. The joint angle patterns resulted in a larger distortion using a constrained approach, especially when wider rotations occur. The range of motion of the hip flexion-extension, obtained simulating different location errors and without taking into account soft tissue artefacts, varied approximately 7 deg using a constrained approach and up to 1 deg when calculated with an unconstrained approach. Thus, the unconstrained approach should be preferred even though its estimated three linear DOFs most unlikely carry meaningful information.
Cereatti
Andrea
A
Department of Human Movement and Sport Sciences, Istituto Universitario di Scienze Motorie, Piazza Lauro De Bosis, 15, 00194 Roma, Italy. andrea.cereatti@iusm.it
Camomilla
Valentina
V
Vannozzi
Giuseppe
G
Cappozzo
Aurelio
A
D016477:Artifacts; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena / Q000379:methods; D003198:Computer Simulation; D005269:Femur / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000502:physiology*; D006621:Hip Joint / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008954:Models, Biological; D009068:Movement / Q000502:physiology*; D010388:Pelvis / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000502:physiology*; D016059:Range of Motion, Articular / Q000502:physiology*