title: Effects of bilateral medial knee osteoarthritis on intra- and inter-limb contributions to body support during gait.
abstract: Patients with knee OA show altered gait patterns, affecting their quality of living. The current study aimed to quantify the effects of bilateral knee OA on the intra-limb and inter-limb sharing of the support of the body during gait. Fifteen patients with mild, 15 with severe bilateral knee OA, and 15 healthy controls walked along a walkway while the kinematic and kinetic data were measured. Compared with the controls, the patients significantly reduced their knee extensor moments and the corresponding contributions to the total support moment in the sagittal plane (p<0.05). For compensation, the mild OA group significantly increased the hip extensor moments (p<0.05) to maintain close-to-normal support and a more symmetrical inter-limb load-sharing during double-limb support. The severe OA group involved compensatory actions of both the ankle and hip, but did not succeed in maintaining a normal sagittal total support moment during late stance, nor a symmetrical inter-limb load-sharing during double-limb support. In the frontal plane, the knee abductor moments and the corresponding contributions to the total support moment were not affected by the changes in the other joints, regardless of the severity of the disease. The observed compensatory changes suggest that strengthening of weak hip muscles is essential for body support during gait in patients with knee OA, but that training of weak ankle muscles may also be needed for patients with severe knee OA.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan, ROC; Department of Physical Therapy, Tzu-Hui Institute of Technology, Pingtung, Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: Yen-Hung
authors.initials: YH
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, School of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC; Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, National Taiwan University Hospital, , Taipei Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: Ting-Ming
authors.initials: TM
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: I-Pin
authors.initials: IP
authors.lastname: Wei
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan, ROC; Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, School of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC. Electronic address: twlu@ntu.edu.tw.
authors.forename: Tung-Wu
authors.initials: TW
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: Shih-Wun
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Hong
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biomedical Engineering, National Taiwan University, Taipei 100, Taiwan, ROC; Department of Orthopedics, China Medical University Hospital, Taichung, Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: Chien-Chung
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Kuo
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D005684:Gait / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D007596:Joints / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020370:Osteoarthritis, Knee / Q000503:physiopathology*; D016138:Walking / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Gait; Knee osteoarthritis; Motion analysis; Support moment