Posturography and dynamic pedobarography in lame dogs with elbow dysplasia and cranial cruciate ligament rupture

Abstract

BackgroundThe usefulness of studying posture and its modifications due to locomotor deficiencies of multiple origins has been widely proven in humans. To assess its suitability in the canine species, static posturography and dynamic pedobarography were performed on lame dogs affected with unilateral elbow dysplasia and cranial cruciate ligament rupture by using a pressure platform. With this objective, statokinesiograms and stabilograms, the percentage of pressure distribution between limbs, paw area, mean pressure, and peak pressure, were obtained from lame and sound dogs. These data were compared with Peak Vertical Force values originated from a force platform in the same recording sessions.ResultsSignificant differences were found in the parameters mentioned above between sound and lame dogs and limbs.ConclusionsPosturography and pedobarography are useful and reliable for the monitoring of fore and hindlimb lameness in dogs, providing a new set of parameters for lameness detection.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1186/s12917-018-1435-y) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Center of Pressure in the Paws of Clinically Sound Dogs in Comparison with Orthopedically Diseased Dogs

“…In veterinary medicine, a wide range of applications for the evaluation of ground reaction forces can be found. In addition to research on the physiological movement patterns of various species [1,2], such evaluations serve as a valuable tool in the investigation of orthopedic and neurologic diseases of dogs [3,4] and enable new findings in therapy [5]. In human medicine, the measurement of the center of pressure (COP) is also frequently used to examine patients with orthopedic or neurological diseases [6][7][8][9].…”

“…It should therefore be noted that there are studies in which the body COP [4,7,8,14,15] was investigated, while other studies focused on the COP of the individual foot (or paw) [13,[16][17][18][19]. In addition, data concerning the COP have been obtained by static (standing) [4,7,8,[14][15][16] or dynamic (locomotion) [16][17][18][19] measurements in various studies.…”

Evaluation of parameters obtained from two systems of gait analysis

“…Force platforms are considered one of the most accurate methods for kinetic gait analysis in dogs, since it allows the evaluation of vertical, mediolateral and craniocaudal ground reaction forces . However, some restrictions of using force platforms have stimulated the use and development of other gait systems, such as the pressure platform and, more recently, the Gait4Dog treadmill…”

Temporo‐spatial and kinetic gait parameters in English setter dogs

“…The temporo-spatial and kinetic studies in dogs are available using pressure-sensitive walkway (Besancon, Conzemius, Evans, & Ritter, 2004;Fahie et al, 2018;Light, Steiss, Montgomery, Rumph, & Wright, 2010;Marghitu et al, 2003;Mölsä, Hielm-Björkman, & Laitinen-Vapaavuori, 2010;Souza, Pinto, Marvulle, & Matera, 2013). In these studies, force-specific dog breed data and reference biomechanics of gait were obtained.…”

“…Retrievers, while the peak vertical force was on the metacarpal pads on the forelimb, it was said to be on the 4th digital pad on the hindlimb (Besancon et al, 2004). It is said that the force values applied to the ground during walking in English pointer dogs are higher in the forelimb than in the hindlimb (Marghitu et al, 2003).…”