Correlation between kinematic gait parameters and balance in children with diplegic cerebral palsy / Amira Fathy Ibrahim Saeed ; Supervised Faten Hassan Abdelazim , Ali Mustafa Abdelmonem

Thesis (M.Sc.) - Cairo University - Faculty of Physical Therapy - Department of Growth and Developmental Disorders in Pediatrics

Objective: The purpose of this study was to investigate the correlation between the standing balance and spatiotemporal gait parameters in diplegics and normal children. Subject: Twenty five normally developing children and twenty five children with cerebral palsy spastic diplegia from both sexes with age range 5-9 years old. Methods: Biodex balance system was used for balance assessment, the anteroposterior, mediolateral and overall stability index were measured. Gait was assessed using videography and Corel Draw Graphics Suite (X5) software, the parameters calculated were step length, stride length, velocity, cadence, stance duration and swing duration. Results: There was significant difference between normal children and diplegics in all tested gait parameters and dynamic stability indices. Step length and stride length had direct moderate correlation with velocity and cadence in normal children, while Step length and stride length had direct moderate correlation with only the velocity in diplegics. No correlation was found between the spatiotemporal gait parameters and dynamic stability indices in normal and diplegic children. Conclusion: spatiotemporal gait parameters and standing balance parameters had lower values in children with diplegia than normal children and they were not correlated either in normal or diplegic children

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