The detection of age groups by dynamic gait outcomes using machine learning approaches

Abstract

prevalence of gait impairments increases with age and is associated with mobility decline, fall risk and loss of independence. for geriatric patients, the risk of having gait disorders is even higher. consequently, gait assessment in the clinics has become increasingly important. the purpose of the present study was to classify healthy young-middle aged, older adults and geriatric patients based on dynamic gait outcomes. Classification performance of three supervised machine learning methods was compared. From trunk 3D-accelerations of 239 subjects obtained during walking, 23 dynamic gait outcomes were calculated. Kernel principal component Analysis (KpcA) was applied for dimensionality reduction of the data for Support Vector Machine (SVM) classification. Random Forest (RF) and Artificial Neural Network (ANN) were applied to the 23 gait outcomes without prior data reduction. Classification accuracy of SVM was 89%, RF accuracy was 73%, and ANN accuracy was 90%. Gait outcomes that significantly contributed to classification included: Root Mean Square (Anterior-Posterior, Vertical), cross entropy (Medio-Lateral, Vertical), Lyapunov exponent (Vertical), step regularity (Vertical) and gait speed. ANN is preferable due to the automated data reduction and significant gait outcome identification. For clinicians, these gait outcomes could be used for diagnosing subjects with mobility disabilities, fall risk and to monitor interventions. Over the last decades, medical and technical developments have extended human lifespan. However, with the increasing number of adults in society, there is a parallel increase in the number of people with serious impairments of mobility, gait, and postural control 1. Natural aging comes hand in hand with mobility decline and impairments in gait and postural control. When the level of decline in physical and cognitive functions exceeds the degree of decline expected due to the natural aging process, we speak of a geriatric condition. Typical geriatric patients are characterized by co-morbidities such as sarcopenia, cognitive impairment, osteoporosis, weight loss, and frailty 2,3. Gait disorders are common in older adults; prevalence increases with age and is associated with increased fall risk, mobility decline, and loss of independence 4. For geriatric patients, the risk of having gait disorders with an increased fall incidence is even higher 5. Consequently, objective gait assessment in the clinics has become increasingly important for the diagnosis of motor impairments and the assessment of mobility decline and fall risk 6 , as well as for the monitoring of the efficacy of interventions designed to improve mobility 7. The most often used gait parameter for disability is gait speed. After age 60, gait speed slows by 16% per decade 8. In geriatric patients, a gait speed below 1.0 m/s signifies an additional clinical or sub-clinical impairment, such as mobility decline, frailty, recurrent falling, loss of independence and institutionalization 9. Complementary to gait speed, aging impacts th...

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