Breen, SarahMentzer, Megan2023-04-242023-04-242023-05-12https://shareok.org/handle/11244/337456It is estimated that 30 to 40 percent of adults who participate in sports experience hip pain (Langhout et al., 2019; Thorborg et al., 2017). Additionally, roughly one in four people will be diagnosed with symptomatic osteoarthritis in their lifetime (Murphy et al., 2010). Due to the hip joint’s integral role in many everyday processes such as walking and bending, it is imperative that the health of the joint be maintained. While various treatments for hip pain exist currently, some patients require extra support while participating in athletic activities, even after surgical intervention such as hip arthroscopy. Current bracing methods available in the market include postoperative stabilization braces, joint unloading braces, and compression wraps (Kemker et al., 2021). However, none of these solutions contain all the desired properties for an athletic hip brace. This thesis sets out to develop a novel hip brace that can be worn during athletic activity, while still providing pain relief and alignment correction to the hip joint. The methods used to create said hip brace are outlined, and then the case study performed to investigate the brace’s efficacy at meeting certain design criteria and outcome measures is discussed. The case study shows that the brace has promising results in the comfort and task initiation categories, but needs improvement in the area of hip alignment correction. In conclusion, with a few modifications in future research, the novel hip brace designed in this thesis has the potential to help millions of people get back to participating in athletic activities even after hip injury.Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Internationalhipbracehip mechanics