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Excess body weight and gait influence energy cost of walking in older adults.

ABSTRACT: PURPOSE:The objective of this investigation is to study how excess body weight influences the energy cost of walking (Cw) and determine whether overweight and obese older adults self-select stride frequency to minimize Cw. METHODS:Using body mass index (BMI), men and women between the ages of 65 and 80 yr were separated into normal weight (NW, BMI ?24.9 kg·m(-2), n = 13) and overweight-obese groups (OWOB, BMI ?25.0 kg·m(-2), n = 13). Subjects walked at 0.83 m·s on an instrumented treadmill that recorded gait parameters and completed three 6-min walking trials; at a preferred stride frequency (PSF), at +10% PSF, and at -10% PSF. Cw was determined by indirect calorimetry. Repeated-measures ANOVA was used to compare groups, and associations were tested with Pearson correlations, ? = 0.05. RESULTS:OWOB had 62% greater absolute Cw (301 ± 108 vs 186 ± 104 J·m, P < 0.001) and 20% greater relative Cw(kg) (3.48 ± 0.95 vs 2.91 ± 0.94 J·kg(-1)·m(-1), P = 0.046) than NW. Although PSF was not different between OWOB and NW (P = 0.626), Cw was 8% greater in OWOB at +10% PSF (P < 0.001). At PSF, OWOB spent less time in single-limb support (33.1% ± 1.5% vs. 34.9% ± 1.6 % gait cycle, P = 0.021) and more time in double-limb support (17.5% ± 1.6% vs 15.4% ± 1.4% gait cycle, P = 0.026) than NW. In OWOB, at PSF, Cw was correlated to impulse (r = -0.57, P = 0.027) and stride frequency (r = 0.51, P = 0.046). CONCLUSIONS:Excess body weight is associated with greater Cw in older adults, possibly contributing to reduced mobility in overweight and obese older persons.

SUBMITTER: Laroche DP

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4362814 | biostudies-literature | 2015 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Excess body weight and gait influence energy cost of walking in older adults.

Laroche Dain P DP Marques Nise R NR Shumila Heidi N HN Logan Christopher R CR Laurent Robyn St RS Gonçalves Mauro M

Medicine and science in sports and exercise 20150501 5

<h4>Purpose</h4>The objective of this investigation is to study how excess body weight influences the energy cost of walking (Cw) and determine whether overweight and obese older adults self-select stride frequency to minimize Cw.<h4>Methods</h4>Using body mass index (BMI), men and women between the ages of 65 and 80 yr were separated into normal weight (NW, BMI ≤24.9 kg·m(-2), n = 13) and overweight-obese groups (OWOB, BMI ≥25.0 kg·m(-2), n = 13). Subjects walked at 0.83 m·s on an instrumented ...[more]

PMID: 25202852

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Project description:BACKGROUND:Body weight support (BWS) systems have shown promise as rehabilitation tools for neurologically impaired individuals. This paper reviews the experiment-based research on BWS systems with the aim: (1) To investigate the influence of body weight unloading (BWU) on gait characteristics; (2) To study whether the effects of BWS differ between treadmill and overground walking and (3) To investigate if modulated BWU influences gait characteristics less than unmodulated BWU. METHOD:A systematic literature search was conducted in the following search engines: Pubmed, Scopus, Web of Science and Google Scholar. Statistical analysis was used to quantify the effects of BWU on gait parameters. RESULTS:54 studies of experiments with healthy and neurologically impaired individuals walking in a BWS system were included and 32 of these were used for the statistical analysis. Literature was classified using three distinctions: (1) treadmill or overground walking; (2) the type of subjects and (3) the nature of unloading force. Only 27% studies were based on neurologically impaired subjects; a low number considering that they are the primary user group for BWS systems. The studies included BWU from 5% to 100% and the 30% and 50% BWU conditions were the most widely studied. The number of participants varied from 1 to 28, with an average of 12. It was seen that due to the increase in BWU level, joint moments, muscle activity, energy cost of walking and ground reaction forces (GRF) showed higher reduction compared to gait spatio-temporal and joint kinematic parameters. The influence of BWU on kinematic and spatio-temporal gait parameters appeared to be limited up to 30% unloading. 5 gait characteristics presented different behavior in response to BWU for overground and treadmill walking. Remaining 21 gait characteristics showed similar behavior but different magnitude of change for overground and treadmill walking. Modulated unloading force generally led to less difference from the 0% condition than unmodulated unloading. CONCLUSION:This review has shown that BWU influences all gait characteristics, albeit with important differences between the kinematic, spatio-temporal and kinetic characteristics. BWU showed stronger influence on the kinetic characteristics of gait than on the spatio-temporal parameters and the kinematic characteristics. It was ascertained that treadmill and overground walking can alter the effects of BWU in a different manner. Our results indicate that task-specific gait training is likely to be achievable at a BWU level of 30% and below.

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Excess body weight and gait influence energy cost of walking in older adults.

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Excess body weight and gait influence energy cost of walking in older adults.

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