Is there a pathological gait associated with common soft tissue running injuries?

Bramah, CA; Preece, SJ; Gill, NM; Herrington, LC

Abstract

Background: Previous research has demonstrated clear associations between specific running injuries and patterns of lower limb kinematics. However, there has been minimal research investigating whether the same kinematic patterns could underlie multiple different soft tissue running injuries. If they do, such kinematic patterns could be considered global contributors to running injury.

Hypothesis: Injured runners will demonstrate differences in running kinematics when compared to injury free controls. These kinematic patterns will be consistent amongst injury subgroups.

Study Design: Case- Control Study

Methods: We studied 72 injured runners and 36 healthy controls. The injured group contained four subgroups of runners with either patellofemoral pain, iliotibial band syndrome, medial tibial stress syndrome or Achilles tendinopathy (n = 18 each). Three-dimensional running kinematics were compared between injured and healthy runners and then between the four injured subgroups. A logistic regression model was used to determine which parameters could be used to identify injured runners.

Results: The injured runners demonstrated greater contralateral pelvic drop and forward trunk lean at mid-stance and a more extended knee and dorsiflexed ankle at initial contact. The subgroup ANOVA found these kinematic patterns were consistent across each of the four injury subgroups. Contralateral pelvic drop was found to be the most important variable predicting classification of participants as healthy/injured. Importantly, for every 1° increase in pelvic drop there was an 80% increase in the odds of being classified injured.

Conclusion: This study identified a number of global kinematic contributors to common running injuries. In particular, we found injured runners to run with greater peak contralateral pelvic drop and trunk forward lean, as well as an extended knee and dorsiflexed ankle at initial contact. Contralateral pelvic drop appears to be the variable most strongly associated with common running related injuries.

Clinical Relevance: The identified kinematic patterns may prove beneficial for clinicians when assessing for biomechanical contributors to running injuries.

Citation

Bramah, C., Preece, S., Gill, N., & Herrington, L. (2018). Is there a pathological gait associated with common soft tissue running injuries?. American Journal of Sports Medicine, 46(12), 3023-3031. https://doi.org/10.1177/0363546518793657

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jun 8, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Sep 7, 2018
• Publication Date: Oct 1, 2018
• Deposit Date: Jul 6, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 18, 2018
• Journal: The American Journal of Sports Medicine
• Print ISSN: 0363-5465
• Electronic ISSN: 1552-3365
• Publisher: SAGE Publications
• Volume: 46
• Issue: 12
• Pages: 3023-3031
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/0363546518793657
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.1177/0363546518793657
• Related Public URLs: https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-american-journal-of-sports-medicine/journal201672