THE EFFICACY OF STROBOSCOPIC GLASSES IN PATIENTS WITH CHRONIC ANKLE INSTABILITY. A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

A. Ibrahim Abdelhamed¹, M. Shahien², M. Fahmy¹, A. Elaraby²

¹Misr University for Science and Technology, Faculty of Physical Therapy, Cairo, Egypt, ²Cairo University, Faculty of Physical Therapy, Cairo, Egypt

Background: Ankle instability is considered one of the most common musculoskeletal injuries.it affects many individuals which may hinder their performance. individuals with chronic ankle instability are believed to rely more on vision when performing an activity due to limited proprioception function, which may increase the risk of injury during activities as patients with chronic instability showed higher reliance on vision during single leg stance. Traditional rehabilitation programs have tried to improve ankle functions through various mechanisms. they have worked on improving the motor abilities without much concern with sensory and visual function, as integration of vision in rehabilitating ankle injuries is crucial. Inappropriate management of such injury can lead to chronic instability. Several ankle functions could be affected such as the balance and postural control as a result, therefore, several physical therapy interventions have been used in order to restore the function. Stroboscopic glasses are novel intervention which could be used to rehabilitate patients suffering from ankle problems. Several ankle functions could be improved as a result of the use of stroboscopic glasses. It can work on the visual input as it is one of the missed components in ankle injuries. So training combined with vision could be more useful for restoring the function of the ankle.

Purpose: To investigate the efficacy of the novel intervention of the stroboscopic glasses in improve the ankle function following injuries.

Methods: We searched the following databases: Pubmed, Web of science, Pedro, and Scopus from inception till 31 august 2022 electronically to retrieve similar articles. We performed an eligibility screening against our inclusion criteria to include relevant articles in the form of: title and abstract screening then full text screening. After that, we included only randomized clinical trials that evaluate the efficacy of stroboscopic glasses in ankle injuries. Any article with the any language rather than english were excluded. Three articles met our criteria and included in the review. Data of included articles were extracted and assessed for quality using PEDRo scale.

Results: Three studies met our inclusion criteria, and included in this review. Due to the significant heterogeneity in included studies, we could not perform meta-analysis for outcomes. The results of included studies showed that stroboscopic glasses were significant in improving static and dynamic postural control (P= 0.01). additionally, regarding electroencephalography measurements, there was a significant difference for the stroboscopic group (P=0.009). However, there was no significant difference in improving the ankle dorsiflexion range of motion.

Conclusions: Stroboscopic glasses is considered as a novel intervention and could be useful and effective in improving the ankle function following injuries such as static postural control and dynamic postural control. However, due to the limited number of available studies, more randomized clinical trials with larger sample size are required in order to formulate a clear evidence supporting the use of such intervention.

Implications: Stroboscopic glasses could be beneficial in the clinical rehabilitation. it may be used as a new intervention to motivate individuals with ankle injuries. Therefore, we should put more concentration to the use of this intervention in our rehabilitation field.

Funding acknowledgements: None

Keywords:
Stroboscopic glasses
Ankle instability
Systematic review

Topics:
Musculoskeletal: lower limb
Musculoskeletal
Sport & sports injuries

Did this work require ethics approval? No

Reason: It is a systematic review, therefore we don not need for an ethical approval.