Investigation of the Functional Balance in Children with Sensory Impairment 6 to 14 Years

Aim: The human body is kept in balance by a complicated process including visual, vestibular, and proprioceptive information. Since the postural control systems require information from all three sensory systems in order to achieve or maintain optimal postural stability, the absence of information of one system may have an influence on body sway during balance .The purpose of this study was to investigate the functional balance in children with sensory impairment 6 - 14 years. Methods: The statistical population of this study was boys aged between 6 - 14  years old with severe and profound vision and hearing impairment. This descriptive analytic study was performed on 30 low vision boys, 30 low hearing boys and 30 normal boys with (mean age 11.76 ± 2.89 years and height was 135.15 ± 13.13 cm, weight: 52.00±29.47 kg, BMI: 19.40± 4.59 kg.m-2);which were selected from the available community by purposeful, nonrandomized sampling. Timed Get up & Go Test (r=0/93) was used for functional balance evaluation. One-way ANOVA and scheffe post hoc test was used to compare groups using SPSS (version 20) software (detection limit P≤ 0.05). Results:functional balance test results showed significant difference between low vision, low hearing and healthy groups (p=0/001), low vision with health group (p=0/000) but there were no statistical difference between low hearing and healthy subjects (p = 1 ). Conclusion: Expected low vision and low hearing can reduce balance and create postural problems in these people. Regarding the results, it was observed that low vision subjects have the most low hearing and normal people.