Walkasins

Sensory Prosthesis For Rebuilding Balance After Nerve Loss

A numbness that starts in the toes and slowly spreads toward the heel often goes unnoticed at first, mistaken for cold feet or the lingering stiffness of a long day on them. When that numbness sets in permanently, it usually signals peripheral neuropathy, nerve damage most often tied to years of elevated blood sugar. According to the American Diabetes Association, 26.8% of adults aged 65 and older live with diabetes, and a meaningful portion will eventually lose sensation in their feet as a result. Without reliable feedback from the soles, the brain loses its main source of information about where the body stands in space, and each step becomes a more deliberate, uncertain calculation. Balance wanes, gait slows, and the confidence to cross a kitchen or step off a curb without thinking twice begins to fade.

The Walkasins Lower Limb Sensory Prosthesis, developed by RxFunction, restores that missing feedback rather than simply working around it. The system pairs a thin, instrumented insole called the Foot Pad, worn inside a regular shoe, with a lightweight unit worn just above the ankle. As a person shifts their weight or takes a step, the Foot Pad measures pressure changes across the sole and wirelessly transmits that information to the ankle unit, which converts it into gentle directional vibrations against the skin. Because sensation above the ankle typically remains intact even when the feet have gone numb, the brain can pick up these cues and use them much as it once used feedback from below, restoring a working sense of balance and foot placement.

As a prescription device, a physician or physical therapist first evaluates whether a person’s neuropathy and fall risk make them a suitable candidate for Walkasins. Once fitted, daily use is straightforward: the device goes on before walking and provides support for an active day out or just puttering around the house. While the system is expensive (priced at approximately $6,000), Medicare has designated Walkasins in its prosthetic device benefit category, which opens a path to partial reimbursement (approval still depends on documented medical necessity and out-of-pocket costs remain high). However, for caregivers who have spent months anxious about a parent’s unsteady steps, it’s often one of the first devices to offer genuine reassurance rather than a workaround.

Feeling solid ground again changes more than a person’s gait. The walk2Wellness clinical trial found that participants with a history of falling experienced a 43% reduction in fall rate after 26 weeks of regular Walkasins use, with gains in balance and gait holding steady from the ten-week mark onward. For some users, that renewed sense of balance means continuing to move through daily life without adding a cane or walker to the routine, a shift that can feel less like avoiding a device and more like holding onto a familiar sense of independence. For family members, that same steadiness translates into fewer late-night worries about a fall no one was there to catch. As sensory prosthetics like this one continue to develop, they offer a practical, hopeful way to help people stay steady and independent in the homes they know best.

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Tags: #rxfunction, #walkasins, #diabetes, #fallprevention, #diabeticneuropathy, #qualityoflife, #walking, #chroniccare