Partner profile

The TLEMsafe research takes place at the Radboud University Medical Centre (RUMC): the Nijmegen Motor Unit (NMU) and the Orthopaedic Department. The NMU where patient measurements will mostly take place is part of the department of Rehabilitation in RUMC. It focuses on motor functions in healthy subjects and in various patient populations (predominantly neurological with emphasis on stroke and Parkinson’s disease). Its research activities are focused along two principal axes. The first concerns the study of gait and new types of gait challenges (e.g. obstacle avoidance; unexpected step-downs; target stepping; dual tasking). The second axis concerns the study of quiet standing balance and postural perturbations. The general aim is to come as close as possible to daily life type of activities or perturbations. A fall prevention program for elderly was developed equally, namely based on everyday type of situations (EU project: EUROKINESIS). The surgical team has extensive experience with involvement of patient groups in clinical and functional studies. The orthopaedic department has an orthopaedic research laboratory which is renowned of its expertise on complex 3-D modeling of bone-prosthetic systems, cadaver measurements and patient studies.

Role / tasks

The role of the RUMC in the project is to involve the patients and measure their functional capacity before and after surgery. In addition, extensive measurements on healthy subjects will be performed which can be used to validate the subject-specific musculo-skeletal models. In addition, the biomechanics section of the orthopaedic department will execute the cadaver measurements to validate the imaging parameterization of the M-S system.

Expertise/leadership

The NMU is worldwide recognized as one of the leading laboratories in the area of posture and gait. The orthopaedic department has world wide recognition in oncological and revision patient treatment and biomechanical analysis of the musculo-skeletal system.

Staff

Prof. dr. ir. N (Nico) Verdonschot - Coordinator

Ir. S. (Sjoerd) Kolk - PhD student

Dr. V. (Vivian) Weerdesteyn - Assistant professor

Dr. ir. D (Dennis) Janssen - Postdoc

Prof. dr. A.C. (Sander) Geurts - Professor