Hypothetical question for any PT

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Posted - 06/24/2008 :  00:28:10  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
Our user asked: "Suppose you were a physical therapist who was interested in determining if a new ACL rehabilitation technique helped soccer players regain their pre-injury performance levels more quickly than existing ACL rehabilitation techniques. For your research, you utilize a pre/post test of 1RM knee extension (using an isokinetic device) and, for your intervention, soccer players with the same ACL injuries are rehabilitated with either the new technique or an older, existing technique. Your results show that players who rehabbed with the new technique had a significantly higher 1RM than the old technique group after 6 weeks of rehabilitation. In addition, the 1RM of the new rehab group appeared to be almost the same as pre-injury levels. However, when these same players attend their first soccer practice, it is clear that both the old and new groups perform equally well (with respect to their soccer skills). In other words, your research suggested one technique was superior but this did not hold true in the actual soccer setting. What could you have done differently to ensure your results were a more accurate reflection of soccer performance?"

Ask a PT Response: "1 RM would not display an accurate reflection of soccer skill s/p ACL recontruction. This test is not functional based and would be a poor indicator for performance. I would suggest utilizng a single leg three hop test in which you would be able to measure the distance hopped on a single leg three times and also visually analyze not only the mechanics of the hop but the stability at the involved knee as well. My hypothesis would be that an athlete that scores higher on this test would fair better on the soccer field. I hope this helps. Thanks for using CyberPT."