Grant: Doctoral: Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarships

Femoroacetabular impingement is a hip bone deformity that affects up to 25% of young active male adults. If not treated, it can degenerate into hip osteoarthritis, a cause of long-term disability. In 2000, 10% of Canadians were suffering from osteoarthritis, imposing an economic burden of $4.4 billion. This warrants an increased awareness of the development mechanisms of femoroacetabular impingement to contribute to the osteoarthritis prevention. An early diagnosis of femoroacetabular impingement is not always possible because the aetiology is still unclear. High mechanical stresses at the site of the bone deformity are postulated to be one of the causes. Since in vivo measurements are invasive, musculoskeletal models are the most ethically acceptable approach to estimate the joint loadings and mechanical stress. To our knowledge, no subject-specific musculoskeletal models exist for this joint. However, studies demonstrated that the specificity of a musculoskeletal model is crucial to obtain reliable results. Therefore, the purpose of this research is the development of a subject-specific musculoskeletal model of the hip, to estimate the joint loading, with the ultimate goal of understanding the development of femoroacetabular impingement. The musculoskeletal model will require the anatomical description of the hip joint and the biomechanical simulation of the principal muscles wrapping this articulation. Once validated, the model will estimate the hip contact forces of patients at different progression levels of femoroacetabular impingement (normal, asymptomatic and symptomatic), greatly contributing to our knowledge of the preventative joint degeneration strategies and femoroacetabular impingement to osteoarthritis development mechanisms. Moreover, the integration of the subject-specific anatomy and muscles activity makes this thesis an original contribution to the field of biomechanics.