The pre-adolescent age is basic in the beginning of the development of body kinematics. During this age the body structure needs to continuously search for stabilization due to the modification in body segment lengths. This behavior can evolve into incorrect postural attitudes that, if not properly treated, can lead to behaviors that are difficult to recover with advancing age.

These incorrect attitudes require an accurate and early diagnosis that can be put in place by expert doctors and clinicians. It is therefore essential to combine the classic cardiac exertion with a postural control that can lead to the identification and monitoring of the important parameters of posture.

As well known, sporting activity in this age can help the development of the proprioceptive apparatus as well as the musculoskeletal one, strengthening the athlete and guaranteeing them beneficial effects prolonged over time and throughout their life. In particular, volleyball is considered a complete sport thanks to the wide range of actions necessary for the game which include both the lower limbs and the superior ones in equal measure. Following this evaluation, it was decided to carry out an evaluation and monitoring study of young volleyball players in what is one of the capitals of Italian volleyball, i.e. Modena.

To achieve this objective, in this work, 97 female volleyball players have been analyzed during their adolescent and pre-adolescent age to find out what is the most important age to control and monitor. The players were visited in a health facility and the parents issued informed consent to participate in the study. The study has the objective to collect data and design a correct exercise routine or insert athlete specific stretching moments into the training to prevent postural problems.

The materials for the analysis were a baropodometric plate and a free imaging analysis software to acquire the most important indexes. The baropodometric plate has been used to acquire stabilometric data to deduce the Rombergs indexes of the analyzed ages. The free imaging software is KINOVEA, an intelligent tool for imaging analysis, that has been used to acquire the typical body angles of posture.

Finally, the data have been analyzed and the most representative ones have been reported in this paper: Sway Area, Centre of Pressure (CoP) Velocity, Postural Skein Length, the right and left body angles, shoulders and PSIS (Posterior Superior Iliac Spine) angles with the ground, Lumbar Lordosis Angles (LLAs), Cervical Lordosis Angles (CLAs) and the Apiombo. These parameters have been graphed to highlight the differences in the considered ages group. The data shows a general imbalance of the indexes around 13-14 years of age which then tend to return with age.


Early Assessment of Posture Disorders Through Pre-Adolescent Monitoring: The Case of Volley Academy Modena

Division / Sponsors: 
Aerospace, Bioengineering, Applied Mechanics, Design Engineering Division, Advanced Energy Systems, Manufacturing Engineering Division, Noise Control and Acoustics, Nondestructive Evaluation, Diagnosis, and Prognosis (NDPD), Nuclear Engineering Division, Process Industries Division, Fluids Engineering, Heat Transfer, Materials, Microelectromechanical Systems, Safety Engineering and Risk Analysis, Computers & Information in Engineering


Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/IMECE/IMECE2020/volume/84478

IMECE2020 - Virtual Conference

Supporting the need among researchers worldwide for additional online and multimedia content, ASME now offers the ASME Conference Video Collection. This platform will collect and provide long-term access to conference presentation videos, encompassing all technology areas within ASME's technical conference and events program. About 30,000-40,000 engineers across all mechanical engineering and related disciplines participate in ASME conferences each year. This includes authors of approximately 6,000 to 8,000 technical papers published by ASME, the majority of whom also submit video presentations for our virtual conferences. The video collection will be available as an add-on to existing product packages or as a separate subscription.