The correlation of ground reaction forces between different simplified pressure sensor layouts and the full layout in flatfoot

Abstract

Ground reaction forces (GRF) is an important gait parameter related to load and injury risk (Lidstone et al., 2017), especially for people with flat foot. Wearable in-shoe pressure systems are widely used to measure GRF because they are not space restricted and allow for participants’ free movement (Fuchs et al., 2022). To facilitate clinical application, researchers attempted to develop a simplified system with a reduced number of sensors without impacting data validity (Fuchs et al., 2022). Previous study showed that the simplified in-shoe pressure system with 11 sensors was the optimal compromise between simplification and measurement performance (Fuchs et al., 2022). However, the study only validated eight layouts with different number of sensors (3-17 sensors). It was unclear whether there were better layouts with same of sensors (11 sensors). Furthermore, the validity of simplified in-shoe pressure system with 11 sensors in flat foot has not been verified.