Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-14-2021

Publication Title

Applied Sciences

Volume

11

Issue

2

Pages

1-13

Publisher Name

MDPI

Abstract

Anticipatory postural adjustment (APA) existed before a self-induced perturbation is an important motor control skill for balance and gait initiation, but cannot be easily monitored. During proactive balance test, a self-initiated weight shifting is produced. This might be an optimal paradigm for APA measurement. The purpose of this study was to investigate if APAs existed in the proactive balance test which consists of quantifiable weight shifting. The feature and reliability of the APAs were also evaluated. We firstly built a proactive balance test program on the commercially available Wii balance board. The program could generate adjustable target direction and distance for guiding subjects performing quantifiable weight shifting. The center of pressure (COP) was recorded and analyzed for balance-related variables (path length, path time, and direction error) and APA-related variables (APA time, APA distance, and APA correction). The results showed that APAs could be detected in every testing trial. Adequate to good reliability in both balance and APA-related variables were found. This study proved the feasibility of quantifying APA during proactive balance tests and its feasibility for clinical- and home-based measurements.

Comments

Author Posting ©️ The Author(s), 2021. This article is posted here by permission of MDPI for personal use and redistribution. This article was published open access in Computers in Applied Sciences, VOL.11,ISS.2, (January 14, 2021), https://doi.org/10.3390/app11020758

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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