Lumbopelvic Stability in Recreational Athletes

Submission note: A thesis submitted in total fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy to the Department of Rehabilitation, Nutrition and Sport, School of Allied Health, Social Services and Sport, College of Science, Health and Engineering, La Trobe University, Victoria, Australia.

Lumbopelvic stability (LPS) is important for injury prevention and recovery from injury in active people. The thesis contains three studies on LPS. The first, a systematic review, which examined the effect of exercise for the lumbopelvic region on lower limb muscle strain injury in athletes, revealed that no studies included an exercise program focussed solely on improving LPS. No studies used clinically based LPS assessment tests or three-dimensional (3-D) motion capture measures of LPS and none investigated if improved LPS impacted balance or dynamic movements such as hopping and landing. The second study compared data from two 3-D motion capture systems: a traditional marker-based system that is time-consuming to use and a markerless system that is quicker to set up and process data. This study demonstrated that the markerless system was suitable to examine assessment tests of lumbopelvic stability, facilitating data collection in a large study. The third study, a randomised trial, compared the effects of two 12-week exercise programs in recreational athletes: a lumbopelvic stability program and an active control stretching program. Athletes assessed as possessing sub-optimal LPS were randomly allocated to one of the two exercise programs and those with optimal LPS continued usual training. The programs were delivered via online video instructions, did not need any equipment, were performed at home, had good adherence and took 45 minutes each week to complete. All athletes had LPS and measures of balance, hopping and landing assessed at baseline, 12 weeks and 12 months. The LPS program was no more effective than the XVII stretching program in improving clinical measures or kinematic measures of LPS, or in improving balance or hopping and landing at 12-week follow-up. This thesis increases our understanding of the effects of LPS exercise in recreational athletes. This may lead to the development of more effective programs to improve LPS.

This thesis was a recipient of the Nancy Millis Award for theses of exceptional merit.