Background. Patellofemoral osteoarthritis (PF OA) is a leading cause of significant pain and disability of the knee joint. Stair climbing dysfunction is commonly reported in this cohort. Objectives. To compare the temporal muscle activation between females with PF OA and healthy controls during stair ascent and decide whether there is a link between altered core activity and Patellofemoral oste...

[Purpose] We investigated the difference in onset time between the vastus medialis and lateralis according to knee alignment during stair ascent and descent to examine the effects of knee alignment on the quadriceps during stair stepping. [Subjects] Fifty-two adults (20 with genu varum, 12 with genu valgum, and 20 controls) were enrolled. Subjects with > 4 cm between the medial epicondyles of t...

Walking up and down stairs is a common and important activity of daily living. Women with fibromyalgia often show a reduced ability to perform this task.The objective of this study was to evaluate the test-retest reliability of stair negotiation tasks and to assess the impact of fibromyalgia symptoms on the ability to negotiate stairs.Forty-two women with fibromyalgia participated in this descr...

The aim of the present study was to establish the behavior of human medial gastrocnemius (GM) muscle fascicles during stair negotiation. Ten healthy male subjects performed normal stair ascent and descent at their own comfortable speed on a standard-dimension four-step staircase with embedded force platforms in each step. Kinematic, kinetic, and electromyographic data of the lower limbs were co...

The purpose of this study was to identify the kinematic and kinetic strategies used by patients with unilateral triple arthrodesis or subtalar fusion during level walking, stair ascent, stair descent and to determine the influence of these different conditions on kinematics and kinetics. Nine subjects with unilateral triple or subtalar fusion and five normal control subjects were recruited for ...

Based on estimates from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), there were about 25,000 baby walker-related injuries treated annually in U.S. hospital emergency departments during the early 1990s. This amounted to about 8 injuries for every 1000 baby walkers in use. Most injuries resulted from falls down stairs. After CPSC initiated a regulatory proceeding in 1994, the CPSC staff wo...

Stair running, both ascending and descending, is a challenging aerobic exercise that many athletes, recreational runners, and soldiers perform during training. Studying biomechanics of stair running over multiple steps has been limited by the practical challenges presented while using optical-based motion tracking systems. We propose using foot-mounted inertial measurement units (IMUs) as a sol...

OBJECTIVES To study the training effects of eight weeks of stair climbing on Vo2max, blood lipids, and homocysteine in sedentary, but otherwise healthy young women. METHODS Fifteen women (mean (SD) age 18.8 (0.7) years) were randomly assigned to control (n = 7) or stair climbing (n = 8) groups. Stair climbing was progressively increased from one ascent a day in week 1 to five ascents a day in...

The incidence of stairway falls and related injuries remains persistently high; however, the risk of stair injuries could be reduced through improved stairway design. The current study investigated dynamic balance control during stair descent and the effects of varying the step geometry. Data were collected from 20 healthy young and 20 older adults as they descended three staircases (riser heig...