Kinematic Design of a Dynamic Brace for Measurement of Head/Neck Motion

Head drop is a symptom commonly seen in patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). These patients usually experience neck pain and have difficulty in swallowing and breathing. Static neck braces are used in current treatment. These braces, however, immobilize the head in a single configuration which causes muscle atrophy. This paper presents the design of a dynamic neck brace for the first time in the literature, which can both measure and potentially assist in the head motion of the human user. This paper introduces the brace design method and validates its capability to perform measurements. The brace is designed based on kinematics data collected from a healthy individual via a motion capture system. A pilot study was conducted to evaluate the wearability of the brace and the accuracy of measurements with the brace. This study recruited ten participants who performed a series of head motions. The results of this human study indicate (i) the brace is wearable by individuals who vary in size, (ii) the brace allows nearly 70% of the overall range of head rotations, (iii) the sensors on the brace give accurate motion of the head with an error of under 5 $^{\circ}$ when compared to a motion capture system. We believe that this neck brace can be a valid and accurate measurement tool for human head motion. This brace will be a big improvement in the available technologies to measure head motion as these are currently done in the clinic using hand held protractors in two orthogonal planes.