Computer-aided optimal design of custom scoliosis braces considering clinical and patient evaluations

Scoliosis causes an abnormal three dimensional curvature of the spine that is often treated by an orthotic device called brace. The objective of this research was to develop a new approach to automatically identify the optimal design of custom-built brace, based on clinical and patient evaluations. In this approach, torso geometry of the scoliosis patient was achieved using a 3-D imaging system that generated a 3-D torso surface model, which was modified using a custom CAD system to design the 3-D brace surface model. Two design parameters, a translational correction factor and a rotational correction factor, were selected to design the brace geometry from the torso geometry. The 3-D digital brace was evaluated by three clinical evaluation measures (imbalance, rib hump and principal axis angle reduction) and one patient evaluation measure (discomfort). A multi-objective optimization method was employed to identify the optimal design parameters considering both clinical and patient evaluations.