Efficacy of the Transition of the Foot Strike Pattern on Pain and Disability in Cadets With Musculoskeletal Pain

Summary

To investigate the efficacy of the footstrike pattern transition from rearfoot to midfoot / forefoot pattern compared to lower limb muscle strengthening exercises and lumbar spine region on decreasing the intensity of chronic musculoskeletal pain in cadets from Naval School. Methods: A randomized controlled trial with blind evaluator and allocation of participants in three parallel groups will be performed. Participating in the study, 81 cadets of the Naval Academy of Rio de Janeiro, between 18 and 24 years of age with chronic musculoskeletal pain in the lower limbs or in the lumbar region and who have the rearfoot as footstrike pattern. Participants will be randomly assigned into the following groups: (1) footstrike pattern transition from rearfoot to midfoot / forefoot; (2) muscle strengthening of the lower limbs and lower back; and (3) usual treatment group. Primary treatment outcomes will be pain and specific disability measured twelve weeks after randomization. Secondary treatment outcomes will be pain and specific disability measured six and nine months after randomization. An intention-to-treat analysis will be performed using mixed linear models to compare outcomes between groups.

Conditions

• Chronic Musculoskeletal Pain

Interventions

OTHER

Transition from the Rearfoot to the Forefoot and Midfoot

Participants in this group will perform a training aimed at the transition of foot strike pattern from the rearfoot to the forefoot and midfoot progressively. Initially a ten-minute race will be held at a comfortable warm-up speed. Then the participants in this group will run continuously at the usual treadmill speed for thirty minutes in a 12-week progressive training program. Participants will run shod and barefoot alternately. Each week the barefoot running time increased to 30 minutes.

OTHER

Usual Treatment Group

This group will perform standard physiotherapeutic treatment performed at the Naval School. This treatment consists of the application of conventional TENS whose parameters are: alternating current, rectangular pulse, pulse duration 100μs, frequency of 100Hz for 12000 seconds. Laser therapy with an energy of 5 J at each point, irradiation area of 1cm², irradiation time of 20 seconds, 30 repetitions and total time of 6000 seconds.

OTHER

Muscle Strengthening Group

The participants of this group will perform muscle strengthening exercises for trunk and lower limbs divided into four phases of three weeks each. The total period of the program strength will be 12 weeks. Elastos® elastic bands of weak, medium and strong intensity will be used to provide progression to the exercises. The exercises will be supervised and supervised by two physiotherapists. A Phase 1 will consist of four exercises; a phase 2, phase 3 and phase 4 will consist of five different exercises each one. In addition to the muscle strengthening le strengthening protocol, this group will have free access to the standard physiotherapeutic treatment performed at the Naval School during and after the study.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Naval School

  collaborator UNKNOWN

• Centro Universitário Augusto Motta

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Ney Meziat, PhD · Centro Universitario Augusto Motta, UNISUAM

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

SINGLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

25 Years

Sex

MALE

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2019-06-15

Primary Completion

2020-08-30

Completion

2020-08-30

Countries

• Brazil

Study Locations