Balance improvements in female high school basketball players after a 6-week neuromuscular-training program.

CONTEXT Poor balance has been associated with increased injury risk among athletes. Neuromuscular-training programs have been advocated as a means of injury prevention, but little is known about the benefits of these programs on balance in high school athletes. OBJECTIVE To determine whether there are balance gains after participation in a neuromuscular-training program in high school athletes. DESIGN Nonrandomized controlled trial. SETTING All data were collected at each participating high school before and after a 6-wk intervention or control period. PARTICIPANTS 62 female high school basketball players recruited from the local high school community and assigned to a training (n = 37) or control (n = 25) group. INTERVENTION Training-group subjects participated in a 6-wk neuromuscular-training program that included plyometric, functional-strengthening, balance, and stability-ball exercises. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Data were collected for the Balance Error Scoring System (BESS) and Star Excursion Balance Test (SEBT) before and after the 6-wk intervention or control period. RESULTS The authors found a significant decrease in total BESS errors in the trained group at the posttest compared with their pretest and the control group (P = .003). Trained subjects also scored significantly fewer BESS errors on the single-foam and tandem-foam conditions at the posttest than the control group and demonstrated improvements on the single-foam compared with their pretest (P = .033). The authors found improvements in reach in the lateral, anteromedial, medial, and posterior directions in the trained group at the posttest compared with the control group (P < .05) using the SEBT. CONCLUSION The study demonstrates that a neuromuscular-training program can increase the balance and proprioceptive capabilities of female high school basketball players and that clinical balance measures are sensitive to detect these differences.