ABSTRACT
This review evaluated the efficacy of Motor Imagery intervention in athletes with lower limb sports injuries that could affect their pain levels during rehabilitation. We carried out a thorough research of the scientific literature for RCT studies in athletes with lower limb musculoskeletal sports injuries including search terms Motor Imagery AND pain, Motor Imagery AND sport injuries, Motor Imagery AND lower limb. We searched 3 major databases, PubMed, Scopus, and ScienceDirect, with the search period ranging from their inception until May 2022. We assessed the quality of the studies using the PEDro Scale and the data was recorded and extracted with the use of Mendeley software. The search criteria resulted in a pool of 10.107 possible articles. Upon completion of the selection procedure, only 3 RCT studies met the inclusion criteria with a total of 60 injured athletes (n = 18 with ankle sprain and n = 42 with ACL injuries). The meta-analysis showed no statistically significant positive effects of MI intervention on pain intensity after lower limb sports injuries (n = 60; MD = -1.57; 95% CI: -3.60 to 0.46; I2 = 50%; p = 0.13). The limited number of studies could justify the statistically insignificant effect of MI, but although the methodological quality of the studies was moderate to high, the heterogeneity of them was also relatively high. More RCT's are required to explore the effect of MI on pain in athletes with lower limb injuries in order to address psychophysiological processes during rehabilitation.
ABSTRACT
[Purpose] The purpose of this preliminary study was to investigate whether young players with no history of injury, have developed early asymmetries in dynamic balance ability tested via the recommended for screening in sports, Modified Star Excursion Balance Test (MSEBT). [Participants and Methods] Twenty-four young healthy male soccer players participated in the study having at least 4â years of systematic soccer training. The Waterloo Footedness Questionnaire was used to discriminate the stability dominant leg (STAB) from the non-stability dominant leg (NSTAB). Dynamic balance was assessed via the MSEBT. Participants, after familiarization, made 3 attempts in each direction for both legs: a) Anterior (AN), b) Posterolateral (PL) and c) Posteromedial (PM). [Results] The sole statistically significant performance asymmetry was in the PL direction, in favor of the STAB (94.5 ± 13.3â cm vs. 98.1 ± 10.4â cm). [Conclusion] The results of this pilot study showed a potential for developing dynamic balance asymmetries, in soccer players at the age of 13-14 years. Since asymmetry was significant in only one direction, further long term monitoring would be helpful to evaluate whether this is a growing functional deficit, potentially involving any of the other two directions of testing or if it is alleviated with increasing training age. These asymmetries could comprise an injury risk factor.
