Dynamic balance asymmetries in pre-season injury-prevention screening in healthy young soccer players using the Modified Star Excursion Balance Test—a pilot study

Abstract

[Purpose] The purpose of this preliminary study was to investigate whether young players with no history of injury, have developed early asymmetries in dynamic balance ability tested via the recommended for screening in sports, Modified Star Excursion Balance Test (MSEBT). [Participants and Methods] Twenty-four young healthy male soccer players participated in the study having at least 4 years of systematic soccer training. The Waterloo Footedness Questionnaire was used to discriminate the stability dominant leg (STAB) from the non-stability dominant leg (NSTAB). Dynamic balance was assessed via the MSEBT. Participants, after familiarization, made 3 attempts in each direction for both legs: a) Anterior (AN), b) Posterolateral (PL) and c) Posteromedial (PM). [Results] The sole statistically significant performance asymmetry was in the PL direction, in favor of the STAB (94.5 ± 13.3 cm vs. 98.1 ± 10.4 cm). [Conclusion] The results of this pilot study showed a potential for developing dynamic balance asymmetries, in soccer players at the age of 13–14 years. Since asymmetry was significant in only one direction, further long term monitoring would be helpful to evaluate whether this is a growing functional deficit, potentially involving any of the other two directions of testing or if it is alleviated with increasing training age. These asymmetries could comprise an injury risk factor.

Dorsiflexion and dynamic postural control asymmetry in elite male volleyball players

“…26 Further, between limb asymmetries ranging from 3 -8% have been noted in collegiate athletes 27 and previous research has suggested that a posteriorlateral between limb difference exists in high level youth soccer players. 28 These results are consistent with the current group level differences observed in all three SEBT reach directions. When such scores are taken into account, meaningful asymmetry does not exist in any of the reported cohorts.…”

The Influence of Dental Occlusion on Dynamic Balance and Muscular Tone

“…Although the original SEBT consists of eight directions, conventional testing procedures have adopted a modified version of the test, using the anterior, posteromedial, and posterolateral directions (Plisky et al, 2006) due to its high level of representativeness (Hertel et al, 2006). The MSEBT version has been widely used in sports as injury-prevention screening tool (Gkrilias et al, 2018) and to evaluate dynamic balance (Hemmati et al, 2017;Denehey et al, 2018).…”

Does fatigue expose functional deficits in chronic lateral ankle sprain?

“…Prior to testing, all participants were initially briefed on the experimental procedure, signed a consent form and completed questionnaires detailing the history of ligament injuries, the functional instability of ankle ligament and foot dominance (WFQr) 9) . The injured limb from the EG and the dominant limb from the CG were tested, since it has been shown that athletes appear to balance better in the dominant leg 10) . The experimental process included 3 sessions intercepted by 3-7 days.…”