Study of the design method of an ankle-foot-orthosis

Ankle-foot orthoses (AFO) are orthotics for patients having pathological gait represented by the stroke. This chapter extracts the three-dimensional digital data from a physical object by using 3D-digitizer. With a 3D-digitized orthotic model, the shape can be modified easily, and finite element analysis (FEA) and stereo-lithography can be easily done. It focuses on patients suffering from hemiplegics stroke to develop a method of fabricating the AFO, which fits the patients even more. The focus of the chapter is on producing an orthotic design method for fitting each patient by measuring spastic muscle action and by deducing parameters for an orthosis from the data. It's important to consider how the outcomes of measurements should be processed as parameters in the design of 3D computer-aided design (3DCAD).