The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of long-term exercises (TaiChi (TC), aerobic dance) on the obstacle-crossing ability of elderly women, as well as to identify whether the exercise could considerably improve stability. Forty-five elderly women include TC, aerobic dance and no exercising groups participated in our study. They walked a short distance to cross the obstacle (30% of leg length). Results showed that long-term exercise had a positive effect on muscle strength and the practitioners used an obstacle-crossing strategy that increasing the force in medial–lateral and anterior-posterior directions of the trailing foot to cross obstacle. The TC strategy was better than aerobic dance in improving balance and increasing the height of the leg during obstacle-crossing

Jia, Yanzhao

Mao, Dewei

Song, Qipeng

Wang, Cuicui

Zhang, Cui

English

ISBS (International Society of Biomechanics in Sports): Conference Proceedings Archive

33rd International Conference on Biomechanics in Sports, Poitiers, France, June 29 - July 3, 2015Floren Colloud, Mathieu Domalain & Tony Monnet (Editors)Coaching and Sports Activities1279COULD LONG-TERM EXERCISE IMPROVE THE OBSTACLE-CROSSINGABILITY OF ELDERLY WOMEN? EFFECTS OF TAI CHI AND AEROBICDANCE EXERCISESCuicui Wang1, Qipeng Song2, Cui Zhang3, Yanzhao Jia2, Dewei Mao1Shandong Sport University, Jinan, China1  Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China2Sports science research center of Shandong province, Jinan, China3 The purpose of  this study was to evaluate the effects of  long-term exercises(TaiChi (TC), aerobic dance) on the obstacle-crossing ability of elderly women,as well as to identify whether the exercise could considerably improve stability.Forty-five elderly women include TC, aerobic dance and no exercising groupsparticipated in our study.  They walked a short  distance to cross the obstacle(30% of leg length). Results showed that long-term exercise had a positive effecton muscle strength and the practitioners used an obstacle-crossing strategy thatincreasing  the  force  in  medial–lateral  and  anterior-posterior  directions  of  thetrailing foot to cross obstacle. The TC strategy was better than aerobic dance inimproving balance and increasing the height of the leg during obstacle-crossing.KEY WORDS：Tai Chi, aerobic dance, elderly women, long-term exercise.INTRODUCTION: Falls account for a number of injuries among the elderly (Ecosse,Sparrow,  Murphy,  &  Newton,  2001).  Approximately  50% of  the  elderly  fall  downbecause of walkway obstacles (Ecosse et al.,  2001). Several studies attribute thehigh fall rate among the elderly to their poor stability, balancing ability (Wu, 2002) andlower extremity strength (Bellew, 2002). In former report, the TC has been proven toprevent falls (Alice & Wong, 2001) among the elderly, and the aerobic dance hasbeen proven to improve the aerobic capabilities (Smol & Fredyk, 2012) of individuals.However, the effectiveness of these activities in preventing falls has attracted limitedattention.  Only  a  few  of  these  studies  analyzed  the  three-dimensional  groundreaction force and compared TC with aerobic dance. Our research aimed to identifywhich exercise could considerably decrease the potential  risks of falls among theelderly, to give advice and improve the quality of life among the elderly.METHODS: Subjects: Forty-five healthy elderly women (age: 67.7±2 years, weight:63.3±4.5 kg, leg length: 74.3±2.5 cm, experience: 4.4 ±2.1 years) who dominantlyuse their right foot in their activities. Include TC group (n=15), aerobic dance group(n=15) and no exercising group (n=15) participated in this study. Testing Protocol: Avicon system with eight cameras was placed 3 m from the left and right sides of a  12m walkway. Two force plates were embedded in the walkway and one obstacle woodbar was placed in the middle of the two force plates with a height that was 30% of theleg length of the subjects (Zhang, Mao, Riskowski, & Song, 2011).  There were fivesuccessful  trials  for  each  of  the  subjects’  crossing  over  the  obstacle.  Date33rd International Conference on Biomechanics in Sports, Poitiers, France, June 29 - July 3, 2015Floren Colloud, Mathieu Domalain & Tony Monnet (Editors)Coaching and Sports Activities1280Reduction: The  kinematics  data  (stride  length,  foot  clearance,  maximum  footclearance, toe distance, heel distance) were normalized to the leg length. The groundreaction force data were normalized to the weight. Data Analysis: One-way analysisof  variance (ANOVA) was used to compare differences among the three groups.SPSS 16.0 was used for statistical analyze, a type I error rate of 0.05 will be used toindicate statistical significance.RESULT:  Kinematics data:  As Table 1 shows, significant differences between TCgroup and other  groups in  maximum foot  clearance and foot  clearance.  The TCgroup  was  significantly  higher  than  other  groups  (aerobic  dance,  p=0.002;  noexercising, p=0.008). However, there were no differences in stride length, crossingvelocity, sing-leg stance time, toe distance and heel distance among groups.Table 1: Kinematics comparison of three groups　 TC aerobic dance no exercisingStride length（%） 1.36±0.23 1.27±0.27 1.41±0.15Maximum foot clearence (%) 0.25±0.08 0.17±0.04** 0.18±0.04△△Foot clearance (%) 0.23±0.07 0.15±0.04** 0.16±0.05△△Crossing velocity (m/s) 1.52±0.54 1.49±0.57 1.42±0.35sing-leg stance time (s) 0.73±0.09 0.72±0.07 0.71±0.06Toe distance（%） 0.23±0.08 0.21±0.08 0.21±0.06Heel distance（%） 0.23±0.07 0.22±0.05 0.23±0.05**Significant difference between TC and aerobic dance，P<0.01 △△ Significant difference between TC and no exercising，P<0.01Kinetics data:  As the Figure 1 (left)  shows, there were no significant differencesbetween TC group, aerobic dance group and no exercising group in the first peakand valleys, but in the second peak, the force of TC group(p=0.001) and aerobicdance group (p=0.04) was significantly bigger than no exercising group. As the figure1 (right), significant difference between TC group and no exercising group in the localminimum of the medial-lateral force (p=0.05). In the second peak of the medial-lateralforce of no exercising group was bigger than aerobic dance group (p=0.028).Figure 1: (Left) medial-lateral force of trailing foot; (Right) medial-lateral force of theleading  foot.   Significant  difference  between  TC  group  and  no  exercising△△group ， P<0.05;  Significant  difference  between  aerobic  dance  group  and  no☆☆exercising group，P<0.05.33rd International Conference on Biomechanics in Sports, Poitiers, France, June 29 - July 3, 2015Floren Colloud, Mathieu Domalain & Tony Monnet (Editors)Coaching and Sports Activities1281As the Figure 2 (left) shows, significant difference among TC group, aerobic dancegroup and no exercising group in the peak and valley values of the anterior-posteriorforce (TC with  aerobic  dance,  p=0.001;  TC with  no exercising,  p=0.001).  As  theFigure 2 (right), significant difference among aerobic dance group, TC group and noexercising group in the valley of the anterior-posterior force (TC with aerobic dance,p=0.002; aerobic dance with no exercising, p=0.002).Figure 2: (Left) anterior-posterior force of trailing foot; (Right) anterior-posterior forceof  the  leading  foot.  **  Significant  difference  between  TC  group  and  no  exercisinggroup,  P<0.05;  Significant  difference  between  TC  group  and  aerobic  dance△△group ， P<0.05;  Significant  difference  between  aerobic  dance  group  and  no☆☆exercising group，P<0.05.DISCUSSION: Kinematics data  analysis: As the Table  1 shown,  the  TC groupdisplayed  a  significantly  higher  value  in  foot  clearance  and  the  maximum  footclearance than aerobic dance and no exercising groups. Our founding was similar asthe former research (Zhang and al.，2011). In order to avoid the obstacle, elderlywould raise the leg as high as possible. There were some possible reasons for theTC participants to increase the height of leg lifts. When they were doing TC exercise,they need to lift their legs as high as possible to complete some unique action. Forexample, when they were doing White-crane-spreads-wings, one unique TC action,they need to lift their left foot as high as possible, so the TC exercise may increasethe flexibility of the lower limbs (Bellew, 2002), so it could raise the height of the leg,avoid the feet touching the obstacles and avoid falling due to the obstacles. The footclearance of aerobic dance and no exercising groups was not high enough, so it wasvery possible for them to touch the obstacles and fall down.Dynamics data analysis: medial–lateral force analysis: Trailing foot strategy,the  TC  group  and  aerobic  dance  group  increased  the  medial–lateral  force  toaccomplish  the  action  during  the  obstacle-crossing,  this  results  was  differentcompared with previous studies (Bellew, 2002), we guessed this was caused by thereason  that  long-term  exercise  increased  old  women’s  muscles  strength(Bellew,2002). Leading foot strategy, TC and aerobic dance groups may have better lowerlimb muscle strength (Bellew, 2002), so in the early support phase, they increasedtheir force in medial direction to balance their body. In the middle support phase, themedial–lateral force of TC group was smaller compared with other groups, so it mayreduce the possibility of body movement in medial–lateral direction. When doing TCexercise,  the  practitioners  learned  to  maintain  balance  and  stability  in  various33rd International Conference on Biomechanics in Sports, Poitiers, France, June 29 - July 3, 2015Floren Colloud, Mathieu Domalain & Tony Monnet (Editors)Coaching and Sports Activities1282postural  actions (Wong, Lin, Chou,  Tang,  & Wong, 2001). For example,  TC usedrepeated up-and-down stepping motions that lift one foot above knee height of thetrailing leg foot  for  a few seconds before returning it  to the ground (Wong & al.,2001). For aerobic dance and no exercise participants, they increased their medial–lateral force during the middle support phase, so it  was possible for them to losebalance in medial–lateral direction. Anterior-posterior force analysis: Trailing footstrategy, long-term TC and aerobic dance exercise may improve the  old women’smuscles  strength  (Bellew,  2002),  so  the  TC  group  and  aerobic  dance  groupincreased the anterior-posterior force to accomplish the action during the obstacle-crossing.  Leading foot strategy, the three groups increased the anterior-posteriorforce  to  control  body  during  the  obstacle-crossing.  However,  the  result  of  noexercising group was bigger than aerobic dance group in anterior-posterior  force.That may be due to the reason that no exercising group wanted to get rid of the stateof single leg support, so the leading foot touched the ground actively to decrease theswing phase duration. CONCLUSION:  The  long-term  exercise  practitioners  used  an  obstacle-crossingstrategy  that  increased  the  ground  reaction  force  in  medial–lateral  and  anterior-posterior directions of the trailing foot to cross obstacles and maybe the long-termexercise had a positive effect  on muscle strength.  Compared with aerobic  danceexercise,  the TC  exercise  may  be  better  for  elderly  women  to  control  balance,increase the height of leg clearance during obstacle-crossing to prevent falling. TheTC exercise was a more suitable way for the elderly women to practice.REFERENCES: Alice, M., & Wong, A.M. (2001). Coordination exercise and postual stability in elderlypeople effect of Tai Chi Chuan. Arch Phys Med Rehabil 82. Bellew, J.W. (2002). The effect of strength training on control of force in older menand women. Aging Clinical and Experimental Research, 14(1),35-41.Ecosse,  L.,  Sparrow,  W.A.,  Murphy,  A.,  &  Newton,  R.U.  (2003).  The  effects  ofimproved strength on obstacle negotiation in community-living older adults.  Gait &posture, 17(3), 273-283.Smol, E., & Fredyk, A. (2012). Supplementary low-intensity aerobic training improves aerobic capacity and does not affect psychomotor performance in professional female ballet dancers. Journal of Human Kinetics, 31, 79-87.Wong, A.M., Lin, Y., Chou, S., Tang, F., & Wong, P.(2001). Coordination exercise andpostural  stability  in  elderly  people:effect  of  Tai  Chi  Chuan.  Archives  of  PhysicalMedicine and Rehabilitation, 82(5), 608-612. Wu, G. (2002). Evaluation of the effectiveness of Tai Chi for improving Balance and Preventing Falls in the Older Population-A Review. Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 50(4), 746-754.Zhang, C., Mao, D.W., Riskowski, J.L., & Song, Q.P. (2011). Strategies of steppingover obstacles:  The effects of long-term exercise in older adults.  Gait  & Posture,34(2), 191–196.

COULD LONG-TERM EXERCISE IMPROVE THE OBSTACLE-CROSSING ABILITY OF ELDERLY WOMEN? EFFECTS OF TAI CHI AND AEROBIC DANCE EXERCISES

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COULD LONG-TERM EXERCISE IMPROVE THE OBSTACLE-CROSSING ABILITY OF ELDERLY WOMEN? EFFECTS OF TAI CHI AND AEROBIC DANCE EXERCISES

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