Can smart rollators be used for gait monitoring and fall prevention?
Abstract
Clinical evaluation of frailty in the elderly is the
first step to decide the degree of assistance they require. This
evaluation is usually performed once and for all by filling
standard forms with macro-information about standing and
walking abilities. Advances in robotics make it possible to
turn a standard assistance device into an augmented device.
The existing tests could then be enriched by a new set of
daily measured criteria derived from the daily use of standard
assistance devices. This paper surveys existing Smart Walker
to figure out whether they can be used for gait monitoring
and frailty evaluation, focusing on the user-system interaction.
Biomechanical gait analysis methods are presented and compared
to robotics system designs, to highlight their convergences
and differences. On the one hand, monitoring devices try to
estimate accurately biomechanical features, whereas, on the
other hand, walking assistance and fall prevention do not
systematically rely on an accurate human model and prefer
heuristics on the user-robot state.