• Colomb Medica · Jul 2021

    Evaluating the effect of a water exercise routine on the postural stability of the elderly.

    • Natali Olaya Mira, Isabel Cristina Soto Cardona, Laura Vanesa Martínez Osorno, Darwin Raúl Mercado Díaz, and Luisa María Henao Ceballos.
    • Instituto Tecnológico Metropolitano, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Aplicadas, Biomedical Research and Innovation Group - GI2B. Medellín, Colombia.
    • Colomb Medica. 2021 Jul 1; 52 (3): e2014537.

    BackgroundPostural stability enables humans to maintain the center of mass of their body within their base of support. Nevertheless, over time, such stability is affected by different factors such as age, repetitive strain, and accidents. Although studies in this field have investigated the effectiveness of hydrotherapy, only a few of them have explored its influence on postural stability, which is reflected in a lack of research that estimates its impact on rehabilitation.AimTo determine the immediate and final effects of an aquatic routine protocol on the postural stability of elderly subjects.MethodsThe postural stability of 20 adults over 60 years of age was analyzed using electromyographic and baropodometric methods. Electromyographic signals were obtained from the tibialis anterior, soleus, both gastrocnemius, vastus medialis, and biceps femoris to calculate the coactivation percentage of the muscles in charge of postural stability. The baropodometric data were collected to analyze the area of the stabilometric ellipse, mean plantar pressure, and weight distribution percentage.ResultsThe outcome of both methods revealed improvements in the elderly patients after the aquatic routine protocol was applied, which indicates that the type of water exercises implemented in this study has positive effects on their postural stability.ConclusionThe postural stability of the elderly participants was improved after each session because their stability index decreased along with the electrical activity of some muscle pairs, their body weight was better distributed, and the area of body oscillation was reduced. However, this effect was immediate and not final.Copyright © 2021 Colombia Medica.

      Pubmed     Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…

What will the 'Medical Journal of You' look like?

Start your free 21 day trial now.

We guarantee your privacy. Your email address will not be shared.