RESUMEN
PURPOSE: To design novel balance tests to assess FAI and evaluate whether these tests are affected by BMI or gender, with the goal of developing reliable FAI assessment tests that are not influenced by these factors. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Participants included 20 young, healthy volunteers, 12 males and 8 females, with a mean age of 24+/-4 years and a mean BMI of 23+/-2.28. None of the subjects had known ankle instability. The following tests were assessed in each participant: single leg balance (SLB), percentage of leg press (PLP), single leg cycling (SLC), one leg squat (OLS), multiple direction reach-front/back/side (MDR-F/B/S), single leg hop (SLH), two leg jump (TLJ) and side step (SS). Data were analyzed using the SPSS 12.0 software program with ANOVA and t-test used. RESULTS: When grouped by BMI, we found that despite differences in BMI, the performances of all subjects were equivalent except for the one-leg-squat test, for which the mean ratios for underweight (1.69+/-0), normal weight (1.05+/-0.19), and overweight (0.93+/-0.30) individuals were significantly different (p=0.02); ratios for SLB (p=0.273), SLC (p=0.903), PLP (p=0.664), MDR-F/B/S (p=0.498, 0.908, and 0.503, respectively), SLH (p=0.332) were not significantly different. When calculated according to gender, we found that the OLS (p=0.013) and MDRS (p=0.034) were significantly different, while parameters for all the remaining tests were not affected. CONCLUSION: We found that the SLB, PLP, SLC, MDR-F/B, and SLH ratios were unaffected by BMI or sex and, therefore, are reliable parameters for assessing ankle instability.