THE EFFECT OF SQUATS ON THE ABILITY TO BALANCE (REVIEW)

S. Lichan¹, R. Prill²

Background: A variety of acute and chronic diseases and injuries limit the ability to balance. The restriction can lead to reduced independence in everyday life and therefore the need for external help, which leads to increased costs in health care. In addition, the ability to balance is the basis for an optimal performance of various sports disciplines and part of injury prevention concepts. Therefore, this group needs effective exercise to improve and maintain the ability to balance. The exercise should be quickly variable and simple in performance and description. Squats is an potential exercise matching those criteria. The aim of this review is to determine the effect of squats on the ability to balance by means of a literature search.

Purpose: The purpose for this project was to find an effective, variable and effective exercise for patients, which has a positive effect on the ability to balance.

Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted by using the pubmed database. Only randomised controlled trials (RCT's) were included. A search was made for studies that involve patients with various diagnoses performing squats over a certain period of time. Therefore, the studies had to use one separate assessment to evaluate the balance/postural control of the lower extremity. The literature search includes all studies published in the pubmed database up to 19.03.2020. Using the operators "AND" and "OR", randomized controlled trials are searched for keywords for all types of interventions with squats and their effect on the patient’s ability to balance. The study quality was assessed with the help of "The Cochrane risk of bias tool" of the Cochrane Manual for systematic reviews of interventions and the Review Manager 5.3 (RevMan). From this point of view, the internal validity of the studies is evaluated by the risk of bias. The authors evaluate selection-bias, allocation-concealment and  performance-bias. Furthermore, the completeness of the included data (attrition-bias) is part of bias analysis.

Results: In this review, 68 results are found in the PubMed electronic database. After a systematic analysis and selection, 6 randomized controlled trials were included in the final review. In 4 studies the subjects performed squats on vibration platforms and normal surfaces. On the basis of the studies, it can be determined that squats with vibrating platforms result in a significant improvement of the ability to balance. The fact that squats significantly improve the ability to balance on normal surfaces could not be confirmed in these studies. Another study shows that fast squats with a stable as well as unstable underground have a positive effect on the ability to balance. There are no positive effects in the study when performing slow squats from an unstable underground.

Conclusion(s): Squats in combination with a vibration platform or even fast squats (on stable or unstable underground) have a positive effect on the ability to balance.  

Implications: Fast squats or squats on a vibration platform can be used as a rehabilitative or even preventive intervention to improve the ability to balance. Thus this exercise can be implemented in physiotherapeutic practice.

Funding, acknowledgements: none

Keywords: balance, squats, prevention

Topic: Sport & sports injuries

Did this work require ethics approval? No

Institution: -

Committee: -

Reason: It is a review without official funding. No approval is required.