Quiet standing and anteroposterior limits of stability in adolescents and young adults with bilateral spastic cerebral palsy

Hidehito Tomita; Daisuke Kawaguchi; Shuhei Takahashi; Hitoshi Asai

doi:10.1016/j.humov.2024.103215

Quiet standing and anteroposterior limits of stability in adolescents and young adults with bilateral spastic cerebral palsy

Hum Mov Sci. 2024 Mar 27:95:103215. doi: 10.1016/j.humov.2024.103215. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Hidehito Tomita¹, Daisuke Kawaguchi², Shuhei Takahashi², Hitoshi Asai³

Affiliations

¹ Graduate School of Health Sciences, Toyohashi SOZO University, 20-1 Matsushita, Ushikawa-cho, Toyohashi 440-8511, Japan. Electronic address: h_tomita@sozo.ac.jp.
² Aichi Prefectural Mikawa Aoitori Medical and Rehabilitation Center for Developmental Disabilities, 9-3 Koyaba, Koryuji-cho, Okazaki 444-0002, Japan.
³ Graduate Course of Rehabilitation Science, Kanazawa University, 5-11-80 Kodatsuno, Kanazawa 920-0942, Japan.

PMID: 38552561
DOI: 10.1016/j.humov.2024.103215

Abstract

Stance stability in individuals with bilateral spastic cerebral palsy (BSCP) in various standing postures including the quiet standing (QS) and limits of stability (LoS) has been widely studied. However, the relationships between the QS and LoS remain unclear. This study aimed to determine the relationships between the positions and postural sway in the QS and anteroposterior LoS in individuals with BSCP. It included 27 adolescents and young adults with BSCP (BSCP group) and 27 adolescents and young adults without disability (control group). The position of center of pressure in the anteroposterior direction (CoPy position) and the path length of center of pressure (CoP path length) during the QS and the anterior and posterior LoS (A-LoS and P-LoS, respectively) were measured using a force platform. The CoPy positions in the A-LoS and P-LoS in the BSCP group were limited compared with those in the control group. In the BSCP group, the more anterior the CoPy position in the QS, the more anterior (i.e., limited) it was in the P-LoS. Although the CoP path length in the QS was larger in the BSCP group, those in the A-LoS and P-LoS were larger in the control group. The BSCP group also showed that the more anterior the CoPy position or the longer the CoP path length in the QS, the more decreased the anteroposterior LoS range was. Therefore, assessing various standing postures, including QS and anteroposterior LoS, is important to manage balance impairments in individuals with BSCP.

Keywords: Balance; Bilateral spastic cerebral palsy; Center of pressure; Quiet standing; Stability limit.