title: Old adult fallers display reduced flexibility of arm and trunk movements when challenged with different walking speeds.
abstract: Specific patterns of pelvic and thorax motions are required to maintain stability during walking. This cross-sectional study explored older-adults' gait kinematics and their kinematic adaptations to different walking speeds, with the purpose of identifying mechanisms that might be related to increased risk for falls. Fifty-eight older adults from self-care residential facilities walked on a treadmill, whose velocity was systematically increased with increments of 0.1meters/second (m/s) from 0.5 to 0.9m/s, and then similarly decreased. Thorax, pelvis, trunk, arms, and legs angular total range of motion (tROM), stride time, stride length, and step width were measured. Twenty-one of the subjects reported falling, and 37 didn't fall. No significant effect of a fall history was found for any of the dependent variables. A marginally significant interaction effect of fall history and walking speed was found for arms' tROM (p=0.098). Speed had an effect on many of the measures for both groups. As the treadmill's velocity increased, the non-fallers increased their arm (15.9±8.6° to 26.6±12.7°) and trunk rotations (4.7±1.9° to 7.2±2.8°) tROM, whereas for the fallers the change of arm (14.7±14.8° to 20.8±13°) and trunk (5.5±2.9° to 7.3±2.3°) rotations tROM were moderate between the different walking speeds. We conclude that walking speed manipulation exposed different flexibility trends. Only non-fallers demonstrated the ability to adapt trunk and arm ROM to treadmill speed i.e., had a more flexible pattern of behavior for arm and trunk motions, supporting the upper-body's importance for stability while walking.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Nataliya
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Shishov
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Yoav
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Gimmon
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Hisham
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Rashed
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Ilan
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Kurz
authors.affiliation: Department of Industrial Engineering and Management, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Raziel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Riemer
authors.affiliation: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
authors.forename: Amir
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Shapiro
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel; Orthopedic Department, Barzilai Medical Center, Ashkelon, Israel.
authors.forename: Ronen
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Debi
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Therapy, Faculty of Health Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel. Electronic address: itzikm@bgu.ac.il.
authors.forename: Itshak
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Melzer
mesh_terms: D000058:Accidental Falls; D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001132:Arm / Q000502:physiology*; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005080:Exercise Test; D005260:Female; D005684:Gait; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009068:Movement; D060726:Torso / Q000502:physiology*; D000072797:Walking Speed
keywords: Falls; Flexibility; Gait; Kinematics; Older adults; Rigidity