Assessment of Physical Performance in Adolescents of Varying Body Weight

Fifty-one healthy adolescents of both gender without any neuromuscular, musculoskeletal or cardiopulmonary disorders and between the ages of 12 and 17 with a mean age of 14.09 years (SD: 1.45 years) were recruited to participate in the 6-minute walk test. Several measurements such as height, weight and leg length were taken before testing, along with heart rate, blood pressure and oxygen saturation (SPO2) before, after and 10 minutes post 6-minute walk test. Walk distance was also quantified and used as an outcome measure. The adolescents were divided into two groups prior to statistical testing. The first group was classified as the “normal” weight group (n=41) and were characterized as normal if their body mass index (BMI) percentile was less than 85%. The second group was classified as the “overweight” weight group (n=10) and were characterized as overweight if their body mass index percentile was over 85%. Results from a multivariate regression analysis (OLS) suggest there is a significant, negative relationship between body mass index (BMI) and walk distance when controlling for leg length and age in the sample. The same statistical analysis indicates a significant, positive relationship between leg length and walk distance, controlling for BMI and age. An analysis of variance was performed for this study in order to investigate if there was any significance in change of blood pressure, SPO2 and heart rate over the three trials between the overweight and normal BMI groups. These tests revealed no significance in performance or change in vital sign between the two groups. Based on our results, we conclude that the 6-minute walk test can be used as a reliable assessment of physical fitness in the adolescent population

A handbook of heart disease, blood pressure and strokes

127 p. ; 18 cm

Drip irrigation of apricot orchards in areas with high evaporative demand and low rainfall: accumulative effects on salinization and some soil chemical characteristics

Experiments were carried out in a mature apricot orchard located in Southern Italy and drip-irrigated since its establishment. Soil samples were taken at the beginning (April) and at the end (September) of the irrigation season at various depths below the dripper and between the rows (area not affected by irrigation). Chemical, physical and hydrological analyses were performed on soil samples. Higher values of salinity were measured in the deeper soil layers, the maximum value of about 1,600 µS cm-1 occurring at 130 cm depth in the area below the emitter at the beginning of the irrigation season. A further increase of salinity was observed during the seasonal course of irrigation, as a combined effect of the quality of the irrigation water (1,200 mg L-1 of total salts), soil characteristics (loamy-clay, density 1.72 t m-3 at 130 cm depth), high seasonal water irrigation volumes used and of the low rainfall