Projects / Programmes
Body asymmetries as a risk factor in musculoskeletal injury development: studying etiological mechanisms and designing corrective interventions for primary and tertiary preventive care.
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 5.10.03 |
Social sciences |
Sport |
Kinesiology - biomechanical, biometrical aspect |
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| B580 |
Biomedical sciences |
Skeleton, muscle system, rheumatology locomotion |
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| 3.03 |
Medical and Health Sciences |
Health sciences |
sport, body (a)symmetries, strength, power, flexibility, stability, anthropometrics, injuries, prevention, exercise
Researchers (18)
Organisations (4)
Abstract
The project will address body (a)symmetries. These have been investigated before, yet several questions remain unanswered:
- which sports contribute to the asymmetry development due to their competitive rules, movement structure and prevailing training methods?
- How are the different types of asymmetries related – local:global and flexibility:strength:power:stability?
- What are the effective interventions to eliminate the asymmetries in order to allow safe participation in sport on different levels? These questions will be addresses by the studies within the proposed project.
Injuries have a detrimental effect both on an individual level, as athlete may be required to abstain from sport participation for significant amount of time, and on the level of clubs, sport associations and society, as injuries are often expensive to treat. Researchers within this project wish to
- A) contribute to the much needed basic knowledge on the etiology of asymmetries and associations between (a)symmetries and sports injuries,
- B) further explore different measures for eliminating asymmetries and treating sports injuries.
The first major work package of the project includes the analysis of sport and movement patterns in sports, particularly of the way in which those contribute to the development of asymmetries and consequently increase injury risk. In the second part, we will recruit a pool of athletes from different sport disciplines and carry out several test on them to seek for potential (a)symmetries. Then, we will retrospectively and prospectively examine the associations between the recognized asymmetries and occurrence of injuries. The test battery will include several aspects of physical ability and function (strength, power, balance, flexibility and kinematics of cyclic and acyclic movement patterns). The last major work package includes two intervention studies. With those, we will:
- examine the effect of two exercise interventions (locally oriented and globally oriented) on eliminating the present asymmetries
- explore the effects of exercise and functional magnetic stimulation on treating the aforementioned three injuries and eliminating the accompanying asymmetries.
To sum up, the results of our studies will provide information on associations of (a)symmetries and injury risk, and hopefully provide evidence for effective interventions to address asymmetries and common injuries.
The project consortium is in possession of broad spectrum of high-quality measuring equipment and has several years of experience on working with it, which will enable as to carry out a holistic examination of participants and their (a)symmetries.
The knowledge discovered within the project will benefit athletes, clubs and associations, and for general populations as it will help them dealing with sports injuries and common pain syndromes. Moreover, it will be also applicable to non-professional athletes and general population. Results from the first phase of the projects will add an important contribution to the knowledge on associations between different types of (a)symmetries and sports injuries, and will represent and important basis for following applicative trials within the project. During the course of the project, we expect that several measuring protocols will be upgraded, enabling the researchers to conduct even more quality studies, while partners/beneficiaries from economic sector will receive valuable feedback regarding their devices/products and procedures, important for further optimization.
Significance for science
Key points:
- Finding new, previously unknown associations between asymmetries and injury risk, and between different subtypes of asymmetries
- Recognizing movement patterns, rules and common practices in sports, promoting asymmetry development
- Providing innovative, interdisciplinary measures to decrease (a)symmetries and treat selected injuries
- Providing currently lacking evidence on effects of functional magnetic stimulation, a promising method for rehabilitation
- Optimization of exercise protocols with respect to injury prevention and better excellence of future practices on this field (more quality preventive interventions)
- Decrease in global prevalence of (a)symmetries, consequently reduction in injury incidence and treatment costs
- Optimization of functional diagnostic procedures in sport medicine
Explanation:
The findings of our studies would represent an important expansion of the knowledge on body (a)symmetries and their importance for safety and efficiency of locomotion of humans in sport and in general. The project will address the differences between athletes of several sports and test a broad spectrum of asymmetries. Particularly valuable outcomes will arise from the interventions studies. Those will certainly be an important step towards optimization of the procedures that aim to establish symmetrical musculoskeletal function and thus reducing injury incidence in sport. The results of both intervention studies will not be useful only for preventive care, but also for rehabilitation, particularly for the return-to-play phase (a key phase for preventing re-injury). The most important added value of the studies within project is their multidimensionality. We plan to include a broad spectrum of the sports and several types of asymmetries (local and global, asymmetries in motor abilities, structural asymmetries), investigate their interrelations and test different approaches for their elimination. Newly established relationships between different types of (a)symmetries will help coaches and other experts in sport science (physiotherapists, sport physicians, metrologists, etc.) to design better and more holistic injury-preventive means, an example of which will be tested within the second part of the project. At the same time, project results will enrich the knowledge on the field of sports diagnostics. Throughout the conduction of the trials, we will form a novel, holistic test battery, which will be able to detect each of the most important (a)symmetries, which impose a significant injury risk. The combination of sports analysis and aforementioned discovery of associations between asymmetries and injuries will be highly beneficial for optimization of training regimens with respect to asymmetry prevention. This will unburden the sport clubs, health services and consequently lower the costs of injury treatment on a global level.
Significance for the country
Key points:
- - Feedback to manufactures of the measuring equipment for helping the optimization
- - Development of functional movement and sport-specific diagnostics test and contributing to quality of research on an international level
- - Feedback to the manufacturers for continuing the development functional magnetic stimulators as one of the most promising treatment methods
- - Reduction of sports injury incidence on a global level (athletes and general population)
- - Expansion of the current professional and university educational programs with new, innovative approaches and knowledge
- - Helping in systematic interventions for health promotion on a national level
Explanation:
Several innovative measurement procedures are going to be employed in the studies within the project. A broad spectre of equipment and software is expected to be used, including the solutions that has never or rarely been used before. The project will convey an important feedback to the designers and manufacturers of the equipment from the economic sector. Intervention studies will evaluate the usability and effectiveness of functional magnetic stimulation and thus help with the further development of complementary rehabilitation methods. Based on the feedback and potential discovered faults, we could work with IskraMedical (producer of magnetic stimulator) in order to optimize their functional magnetic stimulator (e.g. adjusting intensity ranges). Additionally, a new type of applicator will most likely be designed throughout the project, which will be registered as patent due to its originality. One patent request has already been submitted by similar cooperation. Moreover, the simulator’s software will be equipped with preventive and rehabilitation protocols for different pathologies, and will be based on out interventions studies, literature reviews and expert analysis. This will help the experts from physical therapy and similar fields in their practice. If the measurement equipment or other devices prove to be useful and effective, this could be an important help for manufacturers regarding promotion and selling. In time, a circle between researchers and economic sector may form, who will reciprocally cooperate to further improve devices and measurement procedures. In that way, researcher will be able to conduct even more high-quality measurements leading to important fundamental and applicative knowledge, while partners from economic sector will become even more competitive on international marker. Acquired applicable knowledge, accompanied with fundamental knowledge from literature reviews and first phase of the project will be broad enough to server as a basis to for a coarse (or at least a part of it) for current professional and university educational programmes such as physiotherapy, kinesiology, sport training and sports medicine. We will take care that the numerous novel knowledge also reaches the experts in aforementioned fields, by organising professional and scientific conferences and offering additional educational programs.
Most important scientific results
Interim report
Most important socioeconomically and culturally relevant results
