Approach for Unloading Knee Joint Cartilage Pressure: Potential Applications in Post-Surgical Rehabilitation

More than 520 million people worldwide suffer from arthritis, with 60% being women. The knee joint is the most commonly affected, accounting for 365 million cases. Cartilage repair surgery, a promising technique, requires strict control of joint pressure during the post-surgery recovery period. The KNEEUL project, a preclinical technology initiative, aims to develop a knee joint brace that unloads pressure on knee cartilage after surgery, thereby shortening patient recovery time. This type of wearable device, offering such functionality, is unprecedented and presents two key challenges: 1. Developing strategies to effectively unload knee cartilage pressure, and 2. Achieving non-invasive real-time estimation of knee cartilage pressure. KNEEUL will be conducted with the Laboratoire d’Informatique, de Robotique et de Microélectronique de Montpellier (LIRMM) as the host institution, in collaboration with the Laboratoire de Mécanique et Génie Civil (LMGC) and the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire (CHU).The project will address these key challenges through two main approaches: 1. Developing a wearable orthosis that effectively unloads inner knee joint pressure through non-invasive distraction of the femoral from the tibial part. This includes: 1) designing the pressure unloading mechanism, 2) creating a stiffness-adjustable attachment mechanism, and 3) developing and realizing the prototype. This research integrates mechanical transmission, biomechanics, and materials science.2. Achieving real-time, non-invasive estimation and feedback of knee cartilage pressure. This includes: 1) implementing portable measurement hardware, 2) developing a pressure estimation model using multi-sensor data fusion, and 3) integrating the prototype and validating the research approach. This research integrates biomedical knowledge, sensing technology, and intelligent algorithms.