Clinical biomechanics
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Clinical biomechanics · Dec 2001
Lower extremity kinetics during stair ambulation in patients with and without patellofemoral pain.
To compare lower extremity kinetics during stair ascent and descent in subjects with and without patellofemoral pain. ⋯ Subjects with patellofemoral pain had reduced peak knee extensor moments, suggesting that quadriceps avoidance was employed to reduce patellofemoral joint reaction forces. The lack of group differences in peak moments at the hip and ankle suggests that secondary compensation did not occur exclusively at the hip or ankle in this group of subjects with patellofemoral pain. RELEVANCE STATEMENT: Because stair ambulation is often used to evaluate the reproducibility of symptoms and to identify abnormal movement patterns indicative of patellofemoral pain, knowledge of lower extremity mechanics during stair negotiation is necessary to better characterize compensatory behavior in this population.