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Chulalongkorn Medical Journal

Abstract

Background : The most common cause of foot problems is an abnormal plantarpressure distribution. Evaluation of plantar pressure is thereforenecessary in management of foot problems. The tool for plantarpressure measurement is; however, expensive, complicated andneeds special technicians to operate, so it is not widely usedclinically. For this reason, the researchers develop a simple portabledevice for plantar pressure measurement that is of lower cost andeasier to use.Objective : To develop a simple, low cost and easy to use in-shoe pressuremeasurement and define the correlation with the standard plantarpressure measurement tool (F-scan).Design : Descriptive and analytical study.Setting : Biomedical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, ChulalongkornUniversity and Center of Excellence in Gait and Motion, KingChulalongkorn Memorial Hospital.Material and Method : The researchers developed a simple in-shoe system by usingPiezoresistive-insole-sensor to measure plantar pressure at the heel,the 1st and 5th metatarsal head (MTH) during dynamic movement inreal-time. We recruited 30 healthy volunteers (10 males and 20females) to measure their plantar pressure during standing andwalking by our developed device and the standard plantar pressuremeasurement tool which is F-scan. The peak plantar pressures ofthe heel, 1st and 5th MTH were evaluated. The static pressures wererecorded during standing for 30 seconds, and the dynamic pressureswere recorded during walking for 5 meters. The average of 3 trialsfor each session was collected; the data were assessed by theintra-class correlation between the data from our developed deviceand that of the standard reference tool.Result : The ICCs (α = 0.05) of the static plantar pressure measurement ofboth feet were 0.641 (0.370 – 0.811), 0.466 (0.133 – 0.705), and0.721 (0.491 – 0.857) for the right heel, 5th and 1st MTH, and 0.727(0.501 – 0.860), 0.502 (0.179 – 0.727), and 0.545 (0.235 – 0.754) forthe left heel, 5th and 1st MTH, respectively. According to thedynamic plantar pressure, the ICCs were 0.884 (0.771 – 0.943), 0.799(0.620 – 0.899) and 0.878 (0.760 – 0.940) for the right heel, 5th and1st MTH, and 0.826 (0.666 – 0.913), 0.796 (0.614 – 0.897), and0.711 (0.476 – 0.851) for the left heel, 5th and 1st MTH, respectively.Conclusion : Our developed device and the standard reference tool were correlatedby the ICCs, Therefore, our developed device could be used toevaluate abnormal plantar pressure distribution in clinical foot care.

Publisher

Faculty of Medicine, Chulalongkorn University

First Page

223

Last Page

233

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