Background Successful integration of vestibular, visual and somatosensory information results in motor responses to maintain upright stance. When one or more of these senses have reduced efficacy, balance can be affected. When proprioception is reduced, people show greater postural sway amplitudes, resulting in increased centre of pressure excursions as seen in diabetic peripheral neuropathy. T...

[Purpose] Age-related mediolateral (ML) instability of static postural control in the elderly has been well studied. Recent studies have provided evidence that ML center of pressure (CoP) parameters during dynamic postural control are more sensitive for differentiation of the fallers in the elderly. However, very limited studies have been done in which ML stability differences between fallers a...

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the correlation between body mass index (BMI) and postural balance in unipodal support. METHOD 40 males, age 26 +/- 5 yrs, body mass 72.3 +/- 11 kg, height 176 +/_ 6 cm and BMI 23.3 +/- 3.2 kg/m(2), were submitted to functional stability tests using the Biodex Balance System (stability evaluation protocol level 2, which allows an inclination of up to 20 degrees in the ho...

The human postural coordination mechanism is an example of a complex closed-loop control system based on multisensory integration [9,10,13,14]. In models of this process, sensory data from vestibular, visual, tactile and proprioceptive systems are integrated as linearly additive inputs that drive multiple sensory-motor loops to provide effective coordination of body movement, posture and alignm...

PURPOSE To test a model of the path from Activity Limitation (postural instability) to participation (morale), taking account of the influence of psychological variables of appraisal, emotion and self-efficacy. Also to attempt to define whether elderly people with fear of falling are fearful because they are posturally unstable or because they are generally anxious. METHOD Elderly inpatients ...

Older adults demonstrate increased amounts of postural sway, which may ultimately lead to falls. The mechanisms contributing to age-related increases in postural sway and falls in the elderly remain unclear. In an effort to understand age-related changes in posture control, we assessed foot center-of-pressure (COP) displacements and electromyographic data from the tibialis anterior, soleus, vas...

The lateral ligament complex of the ankle is a frequently injured structure in sports and recreational activities, which often results in chronic ankle instability (CAI). Balance exercise training has become a common component of clinical rehabilitation for CAI to address postural deficits. To determine the effect of balance training on postural stability, this critically appraised topic presen...

This study examined how the central nervous system organizes mediolateral (ML) "anticipatory postural adjustments" (APAs) for stepping initiation (SI) to take into account the postural perturbation induced by voluntary lateral arm raising. Subjects purposely stepped in isolation ("isolated stepping") or in combination with lateral raising of dominant arm ("motor sequence"). SI was carried out w...

When a toddler starts to walk without support, gait kinematics and EMG activity differ from those of older children and the body displays considerable oscillations due to poor equilibrium. Postural instability clearly affects motor patterns in adults, but does instability explain why toddlers walk with a different gait? Here we addressed this question by comparing kinematics and EMGs in toddler...