درخت حوزه‌های تخصصی

Purpose: Muscle flexibility is a component of physical fitness. Using traditional tools in muscle length evaluation tests creates challenges. Therefore, the use of smartphones and health-related software as an alternative method has become widespread. This study aimed to investigate smartphones' intra- and inter-rater reliability and validity for measuring hamstring muscle length. Method: In a blinded study design, two researchers measured hamstring flexibility through four types of tests on each of the 22 asymptomatic participants with a total of 44 lower limbs. The measurements were compared between the traditional goniometer method and the practical smartphone application method. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) was used to evaluate the reliability of each smartphone measurement, and Bland-Altman analysis was used to check the measurement errors. The validity of the two methods was also investigated. Results: Intra- and inter-rater reliability (ICC≥0.8) were good to almost perfect. In intra-rater reliability, PSLR angle showed consistent imprecision; other tests were free of systematic error and measurement error. The inter-rater reliability revealed a constant error in the right leg's PKE angle. A good to excellent correlation (r = 0.817–0.699) was observed in all the measured values, indicating the two methods' validity. Conclusion: These findings support from intra- and inter-rater reliability and validity of both instruments when measuring hamstring muscle length.

Background: The functional movement screen is developed to examine individual’s movement patterns through seven functional tasks.Aim: This study was conducted to examine the effect of core muscle fatigue on functional movement screening (FMS) scores in female athletes.Materials and Methods: The study has a pre-test-post-test design. The statistical population included female athletes (18-28 years old) in Tehran with at least two years of sports experience (3 days a week), of which 40 were selected as samples. In this study, core muscle fatigue was examined using the Plank test, before and after which the subjects performed the FMS test. After ensuring the normal distribution of the data through the Shapiro-Wilk test, the effect of core muscle fatigue on the FMS test was examined using Wilcoxon and paired t-tests, and Cohen's D measure was used to evaluate the effect size. The data were analyzed through SPSS 24 software. The significance level in all tests was P≤0.05.Results: According to the results, core muscle fatigue significantly decreased the scores of the deep squat (P=0.001), hurdle step over (P=0.002), in-line lunge (P=0.001), stability push-up (P= 0.001), and rotary stability tests (P= 0.001) but did not significantly affect the scores of the shoulder mobility (P=0.317) and active straight leg raise (SLR) tests (P=0.763). Moreover, core muscle fatigue affected the total score of the FMS test (P=0.001), with the average score decreased by 4.32 after applying the fatigue protocol.Conclusion: Core muscle fatigue significantly reduced the FMS test scores with a medium to large effect size in female athletes.