Angle-angle diagrams in monitoring and quantification of gait patterns for children with cerebral palsy.

This paper proposes the use of hip-knee angle-angle diagrams as an objective method of monitoring and quantifying cerebral palsy gait. Fifteen cerebral palsy children were assessed clinically and studied in a locomotion laboratory. Six normal children in the same age range were also studied. The effects of walking speed on both normal and cerebral palsy joint-angle variables have also been investigated. All cerebral palsy angle-angle diagrams contained abnormal features. A significant relationship was found between the angle-angle results and the clinical assessments. The most important variables describing the abnormality were found to be area and perimeter of the angle-angle diagram, knee angle at initiation of stance and minimum hip angle.