title: Design and simulation of a new powered gait orthosis for paraplegic patients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This article describes the development and testing of a new powered gait orthosis to potentially assist spinal cord injury patients to walk by producing synchronized hip and knee joint movements.
  
  
  METHODS
  The first evaluation of the orthosis was performed without users, and was followed by evaluation of the orthosis performance using three healthy subjects to test the structure under weight-bearing conditions. The orthosis was primarily evaluated to ascertain its ability to generate appropriate hip and knee motion during walking. The walking experiments replicated the flexion and extension of both the hip and knee produced by the actuators which had previously been demonstrated during the initial computer simulations.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results suggest that this new orthosis could be used to assist paraplegic subjects who have adequate ranges of motion and also with weakness or reduced tone to ambulate, and may also be suitable for other subjects with impaired lower limb function (e.g. stroke, poliomyelitis, myelomeningocele and traumatic brain injury provided they do not have increased tone or movement disorders.
authors.affiliation: University of Social Welfare and Rehabilitation Science, Tehran, Iran. M.Arazpour@uswr.ac.ir
authors.forename: Mokhtar
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Arazpour
authors.forename: Ahmad
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Chitsazan
authors.forename: Stephen W
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Hutchins
authors.forename: Farhad Tabatabai
authors.initials: FT
authors.lastname: Ghomshe
authors.forename: Mohammad Ebrahim
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Mousavi
authors.forename: Esmaeil Ebrahimi
authors.initials: EE
authors.lastname: Takamjani
authors.forename: Gholamreza
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Aminian
authors.forename: Mehdi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rahgozar
authors.forename: Monireh Ahmadi
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Bani
mesh_terms: D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004867:Equipment Design / Q000379:methods*; D005684:Gait / Q000502:physiology*; D006621:Hip Joint / Q000503:physiopathology; D006801:Humans; D007719:Knee Joint / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D009989:Orthotic Devices; D010264:Paraplegia / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D016059:Range of Motion, Articular / Q000502:physiology; D013119:Spinal Cord Injuries / Q000150:complications / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D016474:Weight-Bearing / Q000502:physiology