Effect of Ankle-Foot Orthoses (AFOs) on Continuous Walking in Persons with Post-Stroke Hemiplegia

Post-stroke hemiplegia often results in impaired walking performance. To improve walking ability and reduce gait deviations an ankle-foot orthosis (AFO) may be prescribed. Although some previous research suggests that AFOs may provide greater benefit when individuals walk for longer periods of time, walking performance is typically assessed using instrumented gait analyses over short walking distances. Additionally, some limited data suggests that alignment of the orthosis is an important consideration in facilitating efficient and stable gait. Yet, most clinically prescribed AFOs do not fully consider segment alignment. Methods of ‘tuning’ segmental kinematics using AFO-footwear combinations (AFO-FC) have been proposed.