Effects on foot/ankle roll-over characteristics according to different heel heights during walking

This study investigated effects on foot/ankle roll-over characteristics according to heel heights during walking. Fifteen female volunteers who have neither musculoskeletal nor foot problems participated in gait analyses, wearing totally four pairs of shoes with different heel heights. To obtain roll-over shape of foot/ankle complex, we used trajectories of ankle, knee and the center of pressure (COP) between initial contact(IC) and opposite initial contact(OIC) to represent as circular arc using the least-square method. We found that the entire roll-over shape moved distally as the heel height increased but roll-over characteristics did not change significantly with different heel heights. In addition, we found that nondisabled persons automatically adapt their foot/ankle complex to changes in heel height shoes up to 6cm, by moving the origin of roll-over shape distally to keep the roll-over characteristics uniform. Roll-over characteristics in human walking would provide a new understanding of human walking, and furthermore can be applied to the design of prosthetics and orthotics of the lower extremity.