Impact: Safe steps

Solo-Step gift broadens physical therapy research

Physical therapy research in the School of Health Professions (SHP) is taking a ride on the fast track thanks to a gift from the Solo-Step Rehabilitation System. Children and adults with a variety of gait and mobility issues could benefit from the discoveries the device helps researchers make.

Stroke survivor Bonnie Funk practices walking again with the aid of the Solo-Step and physical therapy students Susan Guittar and Josh Frantes, class of 2010. Photo by David Owens.

Originally designed by a South Dakota father whose son lost his leg in a boating accident, Solo-Step is a rehabilitation support system that uses an adjustable harness to support a patient from size extra small to triple extra large. A ceilingmounted trolley attached to the harness allows the patient to walk naturally and confidently. The Solo-Step can be used by patients with problems involving balance, weakness, endurance, or a neurological condition where falls could be an issue.

Unlike the traditional parallel bars, crutches, canes or walkers long used for walking assistance, the Solo-Step allows the arms to swing freely as they do in normal gaits. Physical Therapy Professor and department Chair Marian Minor says that freedom of movement is one of the great aspects the Solo-Step offers physical therapists. “Our research can be focused on both pediatric and adult populations and because the Solo-Step provides a safe and protected environment for balance and gait, we can actually design and test interventions in a more natural setting than we ever have before,” she says.

SHP Development Officer Meichele Foster calls the Solo-Step a great addition to the school. “A donation like this that immediately augments our research and educational programming is significant,” she says. “The opportunity to expose students to the latest advances in rehabilitative equipment is just another component to enhance the quality of an already stellar program.”

One of the premier uses of the Solo- Step is on a 226 foot oval indoor track at the Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital in Washington, D.C. There, returning soldiers relearn to walk, run and engage in other activities.

Other veterans hospitals and universities in the United States, Great Britain and Australia also have the system, but MU is the only academic/education research site for the technology. Solo-Step President Chris Karr says the company is eager to collaborate with a university to examine and quantify patient performance with Solo-Step, discover new applications for the device and possibly foster new product development.

“We’d like to quantify what we see in the real world and that is that patients are recovering faster, more efficiently and with great results,” Karr says. “The patients feel safer and can really push themselves, which they do. No one is holding them or restricting their movement, as can be the case with traditional therapy.”

At MU the Solo-Step is installed in the physical therapy department’s Motion Analysis Laboratory where a computerized motion capture system can record therapy sessions and offer analysis of the patient’s movements. MU does not own the $40,000 computer software needed to analyze the data so faculty must work with New York’s University of Ithaca Department of Physical Therapy, which does own it. Minor hopes to someday afford the software and keep the entire process in Columbia.

“We have several ideas for research. By using the video motion capture we can compare treatment with the Solo-Step to traditional approaches to determine best practices,” Minor says. “We also can combine teaching labs with research so students will have the opportunity to take part in learning about a possible new clinical tool.”