The relationship of peak ankle dorsiflexion angle with lower extremity biomechanics during walking

Review written by Dr Carlo Wood info

Key Points

  1. Limited ankle dorsiflexion (DF) during gait increased knee external rotation (ER) and hip adduction. It also decreased hip extension and pelvic ipsilateral rotation.
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BACKGROUND & OBJECTIVE

Ankle dorsiflexion (DF) of 10° is required during stance. People with insufficient DF may compensate by increasing their tibial internal rotation, knee valgus, hip adduction and internal rotation, pelvic tilt and knee external rotation (ER) angle. Furthermore, insufficient ankle DF may decrease their ankle (plantarflexion) PF moment, hip extension angle, anterior and medial ground reaction force (GRF) and pelvis ipsilateral drop. Limited ankle DF increases the risk of foot and ankle disorders such as Achilles tendinopathy, chronic ankle instability, plantar fasciitis and stress fractures.

The relationship between peak ankle DF angle with extremity biomechanics is unclear. Therefore, this study investigated the correlation between the peak DF during in stance and lower quarter (LQ) biomechanics. They hypothesized that limited DF correlates with reduced LQ activity in the sagittal plane and increased compensation in the other planes.

Limited ankle DF increases the risk of foot and ankle disorders such as Achilles tendinopathy, chronic ankle instability, plantar fasciitis and stress fractures.
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It is valuable to understand all these issues to improve clinical reasoning skills and to inform clinical rehabilitation program development.

METHODS

  • This study included 70 healthy participants (63 males and 7 females) with an average age of 29 years old.
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