Biomechanical and Metabolic Analysis of fall risk of elderly women submitted to a balance training with vibratory pole

Abstract

Falls are common events during daily activities, principally in elderly population. Consequences of falls are potentially injured and this consequence contributes for healthy problems and reduces the quality of life, being considered one of the principal causes of injury and death in elderly population. The aim of this study will be to analyze the biomechanical and metabolic variables indicators of risk of falls in elderly women before and after balance training with and without vibratory pole. Forty eight volunteers of feminine gender will be separated in two groups: young groups (YG), composed by 16 volunteers aged of 18-25 years old, healthy and physically fit; and elderly group (EG), composed by 32 volunteers aged of 60-80nyears old, physically fit and non-institutionalized. Randomly, the participants of EG will be separated in two subgroups: elderly groups, which will do training with vibratory pole (VPTG, n=16); and the elderly group, which will do training without vibratory pole (CG). The evaluation procedure will be composed by two consecutive days. In the first day, will be realized the gait test, gait movement economy test and balance test. In the second test, will be realized the isometric and isokinetic torque. The training of VPTG and CG will begin in the week after the initial evaluation and will hve 8 consecutive week. The same procedures of initial evaluation will be performed after 8 weeks of the begining of the training and after 8 weeks of the end of the training. The electromyographic, kinematic, dinamometric and metabolic variables referred with this study will be analyzed. The statistical analysis will be performed with the verification of normality and homogeneity of the data and posterior, will be adopted the appropriate tests to compare the variables between the groups and in each group. In all of statistical tests the significance level will be set at p<0,05.