Working in Movement

One of my uncles recently celebrated his 90th birthday and was give a gleaming new rolling walker to help him get around. Like most seniors who use walkers, canes or crutches, the idea is to aid in balance. Falls are bad enough for anyone, but can be particularly troublesome for seniors. Anything that helps avoid such a fall is a pretty good thing.

Falls can result from loss of balance, and loss of balance can come from faulty or declining proprioception, the sense that tells us where we are in space. When proprioception decreases, as it does for many people as they age, support from the feet and legs may also lessen. Walkers and canes offer support, but they don't do anything for this lack of sharp proprioception.

But now a group of graduate engineers has come up with an innovative ankle brace designed to address this reduced proprioceptive ability, described in this article. The brace works by detecting the rolling motion of the ankle. If it notices a roll that is greater than usual, it vibrates and alerts the wearer to change position or shift balance.

The brace is a graduate project right now, and not commercially available. It is an interesting application of technology to the problem of faulty proprioception.