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Biomedical subjects

A Howland

Publications and source records attributed to A Howland.

5 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed1999

Effects of shoe collar height and sole hardness on balance in older women.

OBJECTIVE: To determine whether shoe collar height and sole hardness affect balance in older women. DESIGN: A randomized order, cross-over, controlled comparison. SETTING: Intermediate care institution and regional hospital. PARTICIPANTS: Forty-two women aged 60 to 92 years (mean 76, SD = 9.03). The sample comprised 15 hostel (intermediate care) residents, 11 women who lived in a retirement village, and 16 women who lived independently in the community. OUTCOME MEASURES: Postural sway, maximal balance range and coordinated stability. MAIN RESULTS: The subjects underwent assessments of static balance (body sway) and dynamic balance (maximal balance range and coordinated stability) under five conditions: (1) in soft-soled bowls shoes, (2) in hard-soled bowls shoes, (3) in college-style shoes, (4) in college-style shoes with a high (boot) collar, and (5) barefoot. MANOVA analysis indicated that subjects were more stable when wearing the high collar shoes than when wearing the college shoes (P < .001) or when barefoot (P < .05). In contrast, subjects performed similarly in the balance tests in the soft and hard-soled shoes (P = .30) and no better than when barefoot (P = .12 and P = .93, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: The findings indicate that subjects had better balance when wearing shoes with high collars than when wearing shoes with low collars and that sole hardness was not related to balance.

Accidental Falls↗
PubMed1999

Lateral stability, sensorimotor function and falls in older people.

AIMS: To design simple tests of lateral stability for assessing balance in older people and to determine whether poor performances in these tests are associated with impaired vision, lower limb sensation, quadriceps strength, simple reaction time, and falling in this group. DESIGN: A cross-sectional and retrospective study. SETTING: Falls and Balance Laboratory, Prince of Wales Medical Research Institute. PARTICIPANTS: One hundred fifty-six community-dwelling men and women aged 63-90 years (mean age 76.5, SD = 5.1). OUTCOME MEASURES: The maximal lateral sway in a near-tandem stability test with eyes open and closed and the necessity of taking a protective step in the near-tandem stability test with eyes closed. RESULTS: All 156 subjects could complete the near-tandem stability test with eyes open, but only 99 subjects (63.5%) could undertake the test with eyes closed without taking a protective step. Subjects with a history of falls had increased lateral sway both with eyes open and eyes closed as well as poorer visual acuity, proprioception, and quadriceps strength. Fallers were also significantly more likely to take a protective step when undertaking the near-tandem stability test with eyes closed. Multiple regression analysis revealed that impaired lower limb proprioception, quadriceps strength, and reaction time were the best predictors of increased maximal sway in the near-tandem stability test with eyes open. Reduced proprioception and quadriceps strength, in addition to age, were also found to be the best determinants of the necessity of taking a protective step in the near-tandem stability test with eyes closed. CONCLUSIONS: The study findings identify simple new tests that are associated with falling in older people and elucidate the relative importance of specific physiological systems in the maintenance of lateral stability.

Accidental Falls↗
PubMed1975

The development of auditory figure-ground discrimination and ear asymmetry under nonaural stimulus presentation.

The development of auditory word discrimination ability in normal male children has been investigated. 56 school-children (14 from kindergarten and 14 each from second, fourth and sixth grades) were asked to discriminate 50 single-syllable words presented against four levels of background noise (0, +10, +20, and +30). Age, noise level, and ear were all significantly related to auditory word discrimination scores. The results of the study show that with increasing age there is increased ability to discriminate words in the presence of noise. However, although the older the child the greater his ability to discriminate, a far greater effect than age on discrimination is the signal-to-noise treatment level, a finding which suggests that knowledge of the treatment condition may be a better predictor of auditory discrimination scores than a child's age. An additional finding was a general right-ear superiority in the presence of noise, most consistently found under the 0 signal/noise condition for children in kindergarten and in second and fourth grades.

Acoustic Stimulation↗