How peak knee loads are affected by changing the mass of lower-limb body segments during walking
Fig 4
Relationship between added mass and changes in peak knee contact force.
Percent change in (A) early- and (B) late-stance peak knee contact force was computed relative to the unloaded condition. The mean and standard deviation across participants is shown for each of the single-segment loading conditions. We fit a simple linear model to added thigh mass, shank mass, and foot mass using data from all eight loading conditions. The correlation (Pearson’s r) between observed and model-predicted outcomes was 0.71 for the early-stance model and 0.67 for the late-stance model. The portion of this model associated with each segment is plotted as a line-of-best fit over the data (p < 0.032).