Highlights
- •This study characterized natural forearm and wrist behavior during daily activities
- •Subjects spent 50% of time in the central 20% of their functional range of motion
- •Most movements were slow, and movement speed dropped off exponentially
- •Subjects often merged dart-thrower's motion with twist from pronation to supination
- •Importance of dart-thrower's motion may derive from the hand-to-mouth movement
Abstract
Background
During activities of daily living, the main degrees of freedom of the forearm and
wrist—forearm pronation-supination (PS), wrist flexion-extension (FE), and wrist radial-ulnar
deviation (RUD)—combine seamlessly to allow the hand to engage with and manipulate
objects in our environment. Yet the combined behavior of these three degrees of freedom
is relatively unknown.
Purpose
To provide a characterization of natural forearm and wrist kinematics (joint configuration,
movement direction, and speed) during activities of daily living.
Study design
This is a descriptive cross-sectional study.
Methods
Ten healthy subjects performed 24 activities of daily living chosen to represent a
wide variety of activities, while we measured their PS, FE, and RUD angles using electromagnetic
motion capture. The orientation of the forearm and wrist was represented in the three-dimensional
“configuration space” spanned by PS, FE, and RUD. From the time course of forearm
and wrist orientation in configuration space, we extracted three-dimensional distributions
of joint configuration, movement direction, and speed.
Results
Most joint configurations were focused in a relatively small area: subjects spent
roughly 50% of the time in the central 20% of their functional range of motion. Some
movement directions were significantly more common than others (p < 0.001); in particular, the direction of the dart-thrower's motion (DTM) was about
three times more common than motion perpendicular to it. Most movements were slow:
the likelihood of moving at increasing speeds dropped off exponentially. Interestingly,
the most common high-speed motion combined the DTM with a twist from pronation to
supination. As this motion allows one to pick up an object in front of one's body
and bring it to the head, it is essential for self-care. Thus, although many activities
of daily living follow the DTM without significant forearm rotation, the greatest
importance of the DTM may lie in its combination with forearm rotation.
Conclusions
Despite the wide variety of activities, we found evidence of preferred movement behavior,
and this behavior showed significant coupling between the wrist and forearm.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: September 17, 2022
Accepted:
July 1,
2022
Received in revised form:
June 22,
2022
Received:
May 21,
2021
Publication stage
In Press Corrected ProofFootnotes
Conflict of interest: All named authors hereby declare that they have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Identification
Copyright
© 2022 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
