This study compared the full-body flexibility and joint proprioception (on land and underwater) of (a) 20 elite female synchronized swimmers (mean age ± standard deviation = 18.5 ± 1.9 years) and (b) 20 college female swim team members with no training in synchronized swimming (control participants; mean age ± standard deviation = 20.6 ± 1.3 years). Flexibility of the trunk and upper and lower limbs was measured using plastic tape and a goniometer, respectively. Joint proprioception (joint position sense) of the upper and lower limbs on land and underwater was measured by an active joint angle repositioning test. Principle outcome measures were passive joint range of motion (flexibility) and active joint repositioning error (proprioception). Multivariate analysis of covariance revealed that, compared with control swimmers, synchronized swimmers had greater passive joint ranges of motion in the spinal and upper and lower limb joints ( p < .05) and fewer active joint repositioning errors in the shoulder, wrist, and ankle on land ( p < .05) and in the hip and ankle underwater ( p < .05). These results help characterize peak synchronized swimmer capabilities, provide valuable reference details for coaches, and may be useful for talent identification and skill development in this sport.

Introduction The Wii Balance Board (WBB) is a commonly used tool for balance assessment, however the inconsistency in the reported validity for the WBB when used for the assessment of healthy young adults needs to be clarified. Aim To investigate the concurrent validity and reliability of the WBB for balance assessment in healthy young adults. Methods Thirty-two young adults participated in this study. Their ability to balance was tested while standing on a WBB and a laboratory-grade force platform, under three conditions: feet together with eyes open, feet together with eyes closed and semi-tandem standing with eyes open. They had 10 min resting period between tests. The agreement between the WBB and the laboratory-grade force platform was investigated, and the reliability of the WBB was determined. Results A poor agreement between the WBB and the laboratory-grade force platform was found for all standing conditions [intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.03 to 0.07]. A moderate to high reliability was found for the WBB for balance assessment in healthy young adults (ICC = 0.66 to 0.76). Conclusion The WBB was found to be a reliable tool for static balance assessment in healthy young adults. However, it had poor validity compared to the laboratory-grade force platform.

Background: The walking gait of older adults with balance impairment is affected by dual tasking. Several studies have shown that external cues can stimulate improvement in older adults' performance. There is, however, no current evidence to support the usefulness of external cues, such as audio-visual cueing, in dual task walking in older adults. Thus, the aim of this study was to investigate the influence of an audio-visual cue (simulated traffic light) on dual task walking in healthy older adults and in older adults with balance impairments.Methods: A two-way repeated measures study was conducted on 14 healthy older adults and 14 older adults with balance impairment, who were recruited from the community in Chiang Rai, Thailand. Their walking performance was assessed using a four-metre walking test at their preferred gait speed and while walking under two further gait conditions, in randomised order: dual task walking and dual task walking with a simulated traffic light. Each participant was tested individually, with the testing taking between 15 and 20 minutes to perform, including two-minute rest periods between walking conditions. Two Kinect cameras recorded the spatio-temporal parameters using MFU gait analysis software. Each participant was tested for each condition twice. The mean parameters for each condition were analysed using a two-way repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) with participant group and gait condition as factors.Result: There was no significant between-group effect for walking speed, stride length and cadence. There were also no significant effects between gait condition and stride length or cadence. However, the effect between gait condition and walking speed was found to be significant [F(1.557, 40.485) = 4.568, P = 0.024, η = 0.149]. Since walking requires the ability to interact with the external environment, external cues are needed to control and adjust walking kinematics. Many walking variables, such as walking speed, are important for rehabilitation and predict successful community ambulation. Previous reviews have stated that walking speed is the sixth vital life sign in humans because it is associated with functional ability and, more importantly, it could be used to predict the future health status and functional decline of an individual (9). Other gait variables such as stride length and cadence were also found to be affected by performing a dual task (10). When walking in an outdoor environment, many older adults were found to decrease both their preferred walking speed as well as their walking speed in potentially hazardous situations, such as walking while talking when crossing the street. It is therefore important to improve the physical capabilities of older adults by promoting a healthy lifestyle.Promoting the use of external cues is important in improving physical function in older adults. A previous study reported that older adults made more kinematic errors while performing a goal directed movement when the visual cues were lost (11). Similarly, Mah...

This research presents a feasibility to adopt a decision support system framework as a rehabilitation and assessment tool for supporting the physiotherapist in identifying the abnormal gaits of older people. The walking movement was captured by the Microsoft Kinect cameras in order to collect the human motion during 4-meters clinical walk test. 28 older adults participated in this research and perform their gait in front of the affordable cameras. To distinguish an abnormal gait with balance impairment from those of healthy older adults, two machine learning algorithms; ANN and SVM, were selected to classify the data. Experimental results show that SVM achieves the best performance of classification with 82.14% of accuracy, in single-task and double-task conditions, when compared with the standard clinical results. However, SVM cannot achieve an acceptable performance when classifying triple-task condition, achieving only 71.42% of accuracy. As a comparison, ANN delivers only 75.00% of accuracy, which is inferior to SVM. This study show that SVM can be considered as a rehabilitation measuring tool for assisting the physiotherapist in assessing the gait of older people.

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