Prediction of trip severity based on tri-axial accelerometry in healthy older adults

Abstract

Introduction: falls among elderly are apublic health problem and fall prevention is of utmost importance. The ability to recovery from a trip or not might be indicative for fall risk. Objective: toanalyse the relationship between trunk accelerations during the initial phase of tripping and the severity of a tripin healthy older adults. Methods: fourteen healthy older adults (65-73 yrs)walked multiple times over a platform with embedded obstacles and were tripped while trunk accelerations were assessed. Supported bodyweight (BW) by a safety harness was used to classify severity of the tripping outcome into high (>50%BW) or low (<50%BW). Twelve parameters obtained from the acceleration signals and their derivatives (jerk) within the first second after tripping initiation and were divided into three levels of parameter values with equal amount of trials. These low, medium and high values were tested for their association with trip severity in a logistic regression analysis. Results: three acceleration parametersappeared to be significant predictors oftrip severity. High values of minimum anterior-posterior acceleration and minimum vertical jerk showed lower likelihood of resulting in a high severity trip than in the low values (33% and 32%, respectively). Medium values of the maximum anterior-posterior acceleration showed higher likelihood of resulting in a high severity trip than the low values (327%).Conclusion: high acceleration and jerk peaks detected within the first second after tripping predict a more severe outcome, indicating that trunk tri-axial accelerometryhas the potential to predict the severity oftripping outcome in healthy older adults.