Prosthesis control system

A method of controlling an artificial limb in which, during a teach phase, movement of the limb is automatically and repeatedly monitored by electronic means forming part of the limb with a series of measurement data values related to the speed of operation of the limb being generated in the electronic means, a remote control unit is operated in conjunction with a receiver forming part of the limb during operation of the limb to transmit command signals to the limb which are processed by the electronic means to generate setting signals for adjusting a limb movement control device of the limb in real time with the object of improving limb operation, data generated in the electronic means and representing selected settings of the control device are processed in the electronic means together with the associated said measurement data values to generate a set of control data representing a relationship between speed of limb operation and control device settings, and the set of control data is then stored in the electronic means, and in which method, during a playback phase, the movement of the limb is automatically and repeatedly monitored by the electronic means to generate a series of measurement data values related to the speed of operation of the limb which are then processed by the electronic means in conjunction with the stored set of control data to generate appropriate control device setting signals for automatically adjusting the control device according to the speed of limb operation.

A prosthesis control system for an artificial limb, comprising:

• a limb movement controller arranged to control movement of the artificial limb;
• a sensor arranged to generate a sensor signal having a characteristic representative of the speed of operation of the artificial limb;
• a data storage device medium arranged to store a set of control data representing a relationship between settings of the controller and speeds of operation of the limb as represented by measurement values derived from the sensor signal;
• an electronic processor arranged, in a playback mode, to receive the sensor signal and to feed to the controller first setting signals for controlling the movement of the limb, the setting signals representing the controller settings of the scored control data related to the measurement values obtained from the received sensor signal;
• and
• a command signal receiver arranged to receive operator command signals in a teach mode of the processor during operation of the limb;
• wherein said processor is arranged, in the teach mode, to feed to the controller second setting signals in response to said command signals to adjust the controller so as to affect movement of the limb directly under operator control in real time during operation of the limb, to generate an updated set of control data representing a relationship between selected settings of the controller corresponding to said second setting signals and corresponding speeds of limb operation as represented by measurement values derived from the sensor signal, and to cause the updated set of control data to be stored in said data storage device medium for subsequent use in generating said first setting signals.