Kinetic and kinematic analysis of gait pattern of 13 year old children with unilateral genu valgum

OBJECTIVE: Genu valgum is a common knee deformity in growing children. It alters the alignment of the lower extremity, body posture, and gait pattern of the children. Understanding of kinematic and kinetic parameters of gait in genu valgum is essential for planning and implementing the intervention to correcting the valgus deformity. The aim of this paper is to investigate the kinetic and kinematic gait differences in children with genu valgum. PATIENTS AND METHODS: A 13-year old girl with left side unilateral genu valgum and a closely matched healthy counterpart were recruited to compare the kinetic and kinematic parameters of their gait performances, and they were captured by The VICON motion analysis system. RESULTS: The results showed that the child with genu valgum had lower left and right knee angles (39.6°; 30.2°) and higher ankle angles (35.6°; 28.4°) than the healthy subject (64.2°, 60.2°). In addition, the child with genu valgum had lower moments on the left side of the knee (42.1 mm.N) than unaffected right knee (73.9 mm.N). Also, the ground reaction force was (0.7 N) lower in the affected knee of the child with genu valgum than the normal subject. CONCLUSIONS: This study revealed that there were decreased knee and ankle moments and lower knee and ankle ground reaction forces in the affected genu valgum extremity when compared with the healthy counterpart. These changes might be responsible for the altering gait pattern of the child with genu valgum.