Critical reviews in biomedical engineering
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Crit Rev Biomed Eng · Jan 1987
ReviewA critical review of EMG-controlled electrical stimulation in paraplegics.
This review presents a description and provides a comparative performance evaluation of EMG control vs. other approaches to controlling functional electrical stimulation (FES) in upper-motor-neuron paraplegics to provide them with a certain degree of walking ability with walker support. EMG control is considered in terms of a combination of above-lesion EMG control and below-lesion response-EMG control. The above-lesion EMG is to control the activation of different limb functions involved in standing up and walking via FES. ⋯ It is shown that below-lesion EMG control of stimulation levels can be used independent of above-lesion EMG control. Below-lesion EMG control can thus be combined also with hand-switch control or, in case of low level upper-motor-neuron lesions, with pelvis control. Hence, and since FES-activated walking is as good as its control, we conclude that EMG control should be given serious consideration in any FES walking.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)