Machine-assisted foot stretching in the elderly: a comparison with self-stretching.
Naomi Yamada, Shogo Okamoto, Yuma Shiraishi and 3 others
PMID 33814701WHAT IT FOUND
After one session, both machine-assisted and towel self-stretching increased ankle dorsiflexion range in 12 healthy elderly people.
The machine was used on the right foot and self-stretching on the left, so the comparison is affected by starting differences.
Key findings
01Passive ankle dorsiflexion range increased significantly after stretching, but there was a significant baseline difference between the right foot used for machine stretching and the left foot used for self-stretching.
02Plantarflexion strength tended to decrease after machine stretching (p=0.07) and did not change significantly after self-stretching (p=0.49).
03Passive resistive torque decreased significantly after stretching overall, but the stretching method did not have a significant effect.
STILL TO COME
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What it does not show
Only 12 healthy elderly people were studied, and people with marked ankle restriction or foot pain were excluded, so it does not show effects in patients who need stretching. The study measured effects before and after the stretching protocol, not after repeated home use. The machine was always used on the right foot and self-stretching always on the left, so the method comparison is confounded by foot differences. The right foot already had significantly greater dorsiflexion range before stretching than the left foot (p<0.01). Passive torque and muscle-tendon junction displacement were analysed in only 7 participants because 5 did not reach 15° of passive dorsiflexion. Individual responses varied: some participants showed increases in passive torque or muscle-tendon junction displacement after stretching. The authors noted that manual measurement of resistive force might have been incomplete.
Declared interests
The study was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 17K13108 and 20K19403 and Grants-in-Aid for individual research in Aichi Medical College. The authors acknowledge technical support from LAP Co., Ltd. They declare no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that machine-assisted stretching is proven better than self-stretching for older adults at home. The study had only 12 healthy elderly participants, measured immediate effects, and assigned machine stretching to the right foot and self-stretching to the left, with a significant baseline difference in dorsiflexion range (p<0.01).