Wearables for running gait analysis: A study protocol

Abstract

Quantitative running gait analysis is an important tool that provides beneficial outcomes to injury risk/recovery or performance assessment. Wearable devices have allowed running gait to be evaluated in any environment (i.e., laboratory or real-world settings), yet there are a plethora of different grades of devices (i.e., research-grade, commercial, or novel multi-modal) available with little information to make informed decisions on selection. This paper outlines a protocol that will examine different grades of wearables for running gait analysis in healthy individuals. Specifically, this pilot study will: 1) examine analytical validity and reliability of wearables (research-grade, commercial, high-end multimodal) within a controlled laboratory setting; 2) examine analytical validation of different grades of wearables in a real-world setting, and 3) explore clinical validation and usability of wearables for running gait analysis (e.g., injury history (previously injured, never injured), performance level (novice, elite) and relationship to meaningful outcomes). The different grades of wearable include: (1) A research-grade device, the Ax6 consists of a configurable tri-axial accelerometer and tri-axial gyroscope with variable sampling capabilities; (2) attainable (low-grade) commercial with proprietary software, the DorsaVi ViMove2 consisting of two, non-configurable IMUs modules, with a fixed sampling rate and (3) novel multimodal high-end system, the DANU Sports System that is a pair of textile socks, that contain silicone based capacitive pressure sensors, and configurable IMU modules with variable sampling rates. Clinical trial registration: Trial registration: NCT05277181.