## 2 Materials and Methods  
A smart walker prototype was designed to facilitate the monitoring of gait patterns in people with osteoporosis during the rehabilitation process. The prototype featured onboard force sensors integrated into the walking aid. These sensors enabled the acquisition of spatiotemporal gait parameters, including walking speed, cadence, step length, step time, \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c c c} \hline \hline  & & \multicolumn{3}{c}{**Standard Walker**} & \\ \hline
**Reference** & **Technology** & **Method** & **Results** & **Limitation** & **Year** \\ \hline \multirow{4}{*}{[28]} & \multirow{4}{*}{Pick up standard walker} & In this study force sensors, light detection and ranging sensors were embedded in the walker’s legs. & Force unbalance on the walker’s leg and motor incoordination was estimated. & Spatiotemporal gait parameters were not in the scope of this study. & \\  & & & & \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 1: _Cont._stride time, and stride length. The prototype's design aimed to obviate the need for participants to wear external sensors or rely on specialized equipment such as treadmills, electronic walkways, or post-processing-dependent video cameras. The prototype was tested on 40 volunteers, comprising 20 healthy elderly individuals and 20 older individuals diagnosed with osteoporosis. The study design was quasi-experimental, where a physiotherapist administered a standardized 10 m walk test, systematically. Spatiotemporal parameters were acquired through the smart walker including the time of walk, walking speed, cadence, step length, step time, stride time, and stride length. Figure 1 shows Smart Walker prototype equipped with PS2200 Force Sensors. In total, four force sensors were attached on walkers legs including Force sensor on rear right side (**Fs**_RR_s_),Force Sensor on rear left side (**Fs**_RL_s_), Force Sensor on front left side (**Fs**_FL_s_), and Force Sensor on front right side (**Fs**_FR_s_).The developed prototype smart walker with the positions of sensors and electronic components labelled, walker with on board sensors, providing a visual representation of the device that was used to collect data in this study. A walker made up of aluminum body and soft rubber pads on the handlebars was utilized to assist people with osteoporosis in maintaining gait balance, stability and support during their rehabilitation process. We equipped this commercially available walker with four sensors, which were placed at the front and rear legs of the walker to measure the upper limb forces during walking. The sensors were embedded at a distance of 0.7112 m (28 inches) away from the handgrips to avoid damage from overloading. PASCO load cells PS2200 were used as a sensor in this prototype, which measured forces in all directions, eliminating the need for Arduino UNO or microcontroller-based hardware for data transmission. A lightweight load cell amplifier PS2198 was used to amplify the sensor signal, which was then transmitted to a personal computer via USB interface. The sensor signal amplifier PS2198 and USB interface PS2100 are light weight and easily travel with handheld data loggers. For data recording and visualization, PASCO capstone software v 2.0 (free trial) was used, displaying a graph of forces of right and left hands on the handlebars of walkers versus time of the walk. The system is wired but this cannot affect the measurements due to the Well-fitted sockets (six-pin mini-DIN jacks) of amplifier and USB interface which connects walker sensors to personal computer for data recording. Due to wired connections, the current design allowed users to walk up to 15 m. To record gait daily or weekly the user at home needs to setup the hardware and software as follows:  
_Hardware setup:_  
1. Connect four separate load cells to the input ports of the amplifier. 2. Connect the cable of the load cell amplifier to a PASPORT interface. 3. Connect the PASPORT interface to Personal Computer USB port. _Software setup (Data studio):_  
1.