Skip to main content
Download PDF

Volume 7 Supplement 1

4th Congress of the International Foot and Ankle Biomechanics Community

Biomechanical analysis of smart walking shoe sending movement information to display device by radio communication

Journal of Foot and Ankle Research volume 7, Article number: A121 (2014) Cite this article

The purpose of this study was to find the difference in foot pressure patterns when wearing smart walking shoes. Foot pressure measurement is an established tool for the evaluation of foot function [1]. These measurements assess the effect of structural changes, which may occur as a complication of pathologies such as diabetes, and therefore have been suggested as one of the key tools in ulcer risk estimation [2].

The subjects who took part in the test consist of 5 elderly people and 5 young people. The physical features of the elderly people that were recruited for the study are shown below: 5 healthy male subjects (elderly people) with an average age of 62.0 yrs (S.D 1.0 yrs), weight of 69.4 kg (S.D 10.0 kg), height of 168.8 cm (S.D 5.3 cm) and a foot size of 270.0 mm (S.D 0.0 mm). 5 healthy male subjects (young people) with an average age of 27.2 yrs (S.D 4.1 yrs), weight of 75.2 kg (S.D 4.6 kg), height of 175.4 cm (S.D 4.0 cm) and a foot size of 270.0 mm (S.D 0.0 mm). Ten males (5 elderly people, 5 young people) walked on a treadmill wearing three different shoes. Foot pressure data (Contact areas, Maximum forece, Peak pressure, Maximum mean pressure) was collected using a Pedar-X mobile system (Novel Gmbh., Germany) operating at the 1,000 Hz.

Figure 1
figure 1

Type A: development shoes, Type B: control shoes, Type C: smart walking shoes

Full size image
Table 1 Result of Foot Pressure
Full size table

The results are as follows:

1. Young people

In comparison with the Type B (control shoes):

1) Type A (development shoes)

a)The contact area of foot (Total) by increased 8.36%, forefoot (M1) by increased 8.95%, midfoot (M2) by increased 12.18% and rearfoot (M3) by increased 4.48%. b)The maximum force of foot (Total) by decreased 4.02%, rearfoot (M3) by decreased 6.39%, while the maximum force of forefoot (M1) by increased 2.48% and midfoot (M2) by increased 17.52%. c)The peak pressure of foot (Total) by increased 2.28%, forefoot (M1) by increased 6.19%, while the peak pressure of midfoot (M2) by decreased 2.91% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 13.69%. d)The maximum mean pressure of foot (Total) by decreased 12.74%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 6.90%, midfoot (M2) by decreased 2.79% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 11.18%.

2) Type C (smart walking shoes)

a)The contact area of foot (Total) by increased 7.96%, forefoot (M1) by increased 8.90%, midfoot (M2) by increased 11.81% and rearfoot (M3) by increased 3.50%. b)The maximum force of foot (Total) by decreased 5.27%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 0.67% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 5.67%, while the maximum force of midfoot (M2) by increased 23.55%. c)The peak pressure of foot (Total) by decreased 6.70%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 3.35% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 10.54%, while the peak pressure of midfoot (M2) by increased 2.19%. d)The maximum mean pressure of foot (Total) by decreased 10.97%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 7.62%, midfoot (M2) by decreased 1.15% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 8.02%.

2. Elderly people

In comparison with the Type B (control shoes):

1) Type A (development shoes)

a)The contact area of foot (Total) by increased 8.09%, forefoot (M1) by increased 5.47%, midfoot (M2) by increased 22.66% and rearfoot (M3) by increased 3.21%. b)The maximum force of foot (Total) by decreased 2.13%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 3.53% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 9.85%, while the maximum force of midfoot (M2) by increased 41.32%. c)The peak pressure of foot (Total) by decreased 11.02%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 11.24%, midfoot (M2) by decreased 2.81% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 18.85%. d)The maximum mean pressure force of foot (Total) by decreased 10.60%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 7.05% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 14.42%, while the maximum force of midfoot (M2) by increased 3.04%.

2) Type C (smart walking shoes)

a)The contact area of foot (Total) by increased 7.08%, forefoot (M1) by increased 5.62%, midfoot (M2) by increased 17.14% and rearfoot (M3) by increased 3.12%. b)The maximum force of foot (Total) by decreased 1.47%, rearfoot (M3) by decreased 7.37%, while the maximum force of forefoot (M1) by increased 0.19% and midfoot (M2) by increased 24.15%. c)The peak pressure of foot (Total) by increased 0.03%, forefoot (M1) by increased 0.74%, while the peak pressure of midfoot (M2) by decreased 15.51% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 14.73%. d)The maximum mean pressure of foot (Total) by decreased 8.95%, forefoot (M1) by decreased 5.62%, midfoot (M2) by decreased 6.30% and rearfoot (M3) by decreased 11.82%.

As a result of analysis, it has been found that Type A and Type C have lower foot pressure (Total, M3) than Type B. Also, Type A and Type C show superior performance compared to Type B in all mask at contact area. Type A and Type C shoes will be used to reduce foot pressure and increase comfort and fitting.

References

  1. Jason K Gurney, Uwe G Kersting, Dieter Rosenbaum: SBetween-day reliability of repeated plantar pressure distribution measurements in a normal population. Gait & Posture. 2007, 27: 706-709.

    Google Scholar 

  2. Cavanagh PR, Simoneau GG, Ulbrecht JS: Ulceration, unsteadiness, and uncertainty: the biomechanical consequences of diabetes mellitus. Journal of Biomechanics. 1993, 26 (11): 23-40.

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Footwear Biomechanics Team, Footwear Industrial Promotion Center, Busan, Korea

    Seung-Bum Park, Kyung-Deuk Lee, Dae-Woong Kim, Jung-Hyeon Yoo & Kyung-Hun Kim

Authors
  1. Seung-Bum Park
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Kyung-Deuk Lee
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Dae-Woong Kim
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Jung-Hyeon Yoo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Kyung-Hun Kim
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Seung-Bum Park.

Rights and permissions

This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Park, SB., Lee, KD., Kim, DW. et al. Biomechanical analysis of smart walking shoe sending movement information to display device by radio communication. J Foot Ankle Res 7 (Suppl 1), A121 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1186/1757-1146-7-S1-A121

Download citation

  • Published:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/1757-1146-7-S1-A121

Keywords

  • Young People
  • Contact Area
  • Elderly People
  • Risk Estimation
  • Superior Performance

Journal of Foot and Ankle Research

ISSN: 1757-1146