Assessment of postural adjustments in persons with intellectual disability during balance on the seesaw.

BACKGROUND The purpose of this study was to investigate the kinematic and electromyography strategy used by individuals with intellectual disability to keep equilibrium during anterior-posterior balance on seesaws with different degrees of instability. METHOD Six individuals with Down syndrome (DS) and six control group individuals (CG) balanced on three seesaws. The movement of the hip, knee and ankle joints and electromyography activities of selected leg and trunk muscles were recorded. RESULTS Both groups maintained their balance mainly at the ankle joint. Contrary to the CG, the individuals with DS adopted a pattern of co-contraction and were not able to modulate the magnitude of postural response with the seesaw's degree of instability. CONCLUSIONS These unusual strategies used by individuals with DS, such as their inability to discriminate different levels of mechanical demands in terms of the seesaw's instability, can reflect deficits in the proprioceptive system. The integration at cerebellum level could be a good candidate.

[1]  L. Mainardi,et al.  Postural control in patients with Down syndrome , 2008, Disability and rehabilitation.

[2]  J. Barela,et al.  Postural control in down syndrome: the use of somatosensory and visual information to attenuate body sway. , 2007, Motor control.

[3]  Marie-Claude Potier,et al.  Down syndrome gene dosage imbalance on cerebellum development , 2007, Progress in Neurobiology.

[4]  Beth A. Smith,et al.  Effect of Practice on a Novel Task—Walking on a Treadmill: Preadolescents With and Without Down Syndrome , 2007, Physical Therapy.

[5]  Rose L Smith.  Therapeutic Modalities for Musculoskeletal Injuries, ed 2 , 2007, Physical Therapy.

[6]  K. Holt,et al.  Modeling dynamic resource utilization in populations with unique constraints: preadolescents with and without Down syndrome. , 2004, Human movement science.

[7]  N. Virji-Babul,et al.  Stiffness and postural stability in adults with Down syndrome , 2004, Experimental Brain Research.

[8]  N. Vuillerme,et al.  Assessment of Static Postural Control in Teenagers with Down Syndrome , 2001 .

[9]  Thomas Rosemeier,et al.  Interaction of vestibular, somatosensory and visual signals for postural control and motion perception under terrestrial and microgravity conditions—a conceptual model , 1998, Brain Research Reviews.

[10]  V. S. Gurfinkel,et al.  Human equilibrium on unstable support: the importance of feet-support interaction , 1997, Neuroscience Letters.

[11]  Alexander S. Aruin,et al.  A Coactivation Strategy in Anticipatory Postural Adjustments in Persons with Down Syndrome , 1997 .

[12]  M. Latash,et al.  What are “normal movements” in atypical populations? , 1996, Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

[13]  I. Rosén,et al.  Impaired Peripheral Somatosensory Function in Children with Down Syndrome , 1995, Neuropediatrics.

[14]  M. Cioni,et al.  Strength deficit of knee extensor muscles of individuals with Down syndrome from childhood to adolescence. , 1994, American journal of mental retardation : AJMR.

[15]  J H Abbs,et al.  DEFICITS FORCES THE PRODUCTION OF GRIP DOWN SYNDROME , 1988, Developmental medicine and child neurology.

[16]  M. Woollacott,et al.  Dynamics of postural control in the child with Down syndrome. , 1985, Physical therapy.

[17]  F. Horak,et al.  Somatosensory influence on postural response to galvanic vestibular stimulation. , 2006, Physiological research.

[18]  G L Almeida,et al.  Postural strategy to keep balance on the seesaw. , 2006, Gait & posture.

[19]  M. Fragala-Pinkham,et al.  Effects of Aerobic Conditioning and Strength Training on a Child with Down Syndrome: A Case Study , 2005, Pediatric physical therapy : the official publication of the Section on Pediatrics of the American Physical Therapy Association.

[20]  S. Haley.  Postural Reactions in Infants with Down Syndrome , 1986 .