The Development of a Normative Gait Database

Abstract

Normative data is an essential component of clinical gait analyses. The Institute of Biomedical Engineering (IBME) at the University of New Brunswick has recently collected gait data from 58 normal children aged 1-13 years to establish a normative database. A six-camera Vicon 512 motion analysis system and force plates were employed to obtain temporal-spatial, kinematic, and kinetic parameters during walking. Statistical techniques, which allow quantitative comparison between this normative data and historical data from the Children’s Hospital, San Diego, were used to assess normality of the new database. Significant differences between the 2 databases were found for sagittal joint angle data. It was concluded that data processing techniques and instrumentation are associated with these differences.