Analysis, Design And Manufacturing Of Ankle Foot Orthoses

Ankle foot orthoses (AFOs) are prescribed to paraplegic patients with low level spinal cord injury and with good control of the trunk muscles. In this work, plastic materials (polypropylene) are used for manufacturing ankle foot orthoses (AFO) with drop foot fabricated using vacuum molding technique. The tensile test results showed that the mechanical properties for polypropylene were, Ϭy= 24.73Mpa Ϭult=35.76 MPa Ϭb max=67.66Mpa and Elongation at Break=38.26mm. The data of gait cycle (Ground Reaction Force (GRF) by using force plate and pressure distribution by using Fsocket) were collected for two patients, the first of age about (42 years) with height (173cm) and weight( 82kg) suffered from drop foot due to severing of the nerve damage and the second have age about (10 years) with height (130cm) and weight (23 kg) suffered from drop foot due to cerebral palsy which makes the patients unable to control for lift the foot. The gait velocity without AFO equals to 0.43m/sec when wearing plastic AFO equal to 0.64m/sec for first patient and gait velocity without AFO equal to 0.697m/sec when wearing plastic AFO equal to 0.756m/sec for second patient. The gait cycle time for patients without AFO equal to 42.6% but when wearing ankle foot orthosis (AFO) equals to 97%.The two patients were wearing orthosis type AFO for drop foot with right lower extremity.