Submission Date

4-27-2015

Document Type

Paper- Restricted to Campus Access

Department

Health & Exercise Physiology

Adviser

Deborah Feairheller

Committee Member

Tina Wailgum

Committee Member

Laura Borsdorf

Committee Member

Mark Ellison

Department Chair

Del Engstrom

External Reviewer

Katherine Morrison

Distinguished Honors

This paper has met the requirements of Distinguished Honors

Project Description

Joint misalignment and reduced range of motion (ROM) can lead to discomfort during physical activity, thus creating a barrier to exercise. Lack of physical activity is related to cardiovascular (CV) disease and obesity. Studies show that obese individuals have a larger quadriceps (Q) angle, resulting in misaligned lower extremities. Thus, the connection between CV health status, joint angle, and ROM could be used to understand joint pain and reluctance to exercise. We examined associations between joint angles and CV health and fitness in 53 adults (29F, 24M, 25.2 ±10.5 yrs). Joint angle and ROM was measured with a goniometer. CV health was measured by: body composition, fasted glucose/cholesterol levels, VO2 exercise test, and 24 hour ambulatory blood pressure (BP) monitoring. A main finding was that standing Q angle is inversely related to VO2max for the left leg (r= -0.344), directly related to fat mass (FM) for the left (r= 0.391) and right leg (r= 0.330), directly related to body fat for the left (r= 0.397) and right leg (r= 0.528), and directly related to body mass index (BMI) for the left leg (r= 0.406) (p2max for the right leg (r= 0.343, p2max could be associated with increased ROM in the ankle.

Download

Share

COinS