Two measures of foot pressure image to detect foot drop of elderly diabetes sufferers

Two new measures of foot pressure image have been established for studying the severity of foot drop of sufferers of diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN). These measures are: plantar distance travelled from heel; and apparent delay in forefoot travelled from 2
^nd
metatarsal head to toe-off. These measures were obtained by precise marking of the conjugate second metatarsal head location and the conjugate pternion location, thus establishing the medial foot axis (MFA) on the pedobarograph. Using the plantar pressure pattern and recorded time of the pedobarograph, apparent plantar distance (PDH) and apparent 2nd metatarsal head to toe-off delay (MHTOD) were calculated. Healthy and diabetic older male and female adults were recruited from diabetic clinics and retirement homes in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia. The null hypothesis of comparing the DPN group and healthy group using PDH was accepted. However, MHTOD was not statistically verified as a suitable measure for DPN foot drop detection. This small clinical validation project showed that by utilizing plantar-pressure characteristics and precisely recorded time of the pedobarograph it would be possible to detect foot-drop issues accurately.