An investigation of the ability of wearable technology to aid physiotherapists in assessing jump-landing movement compared to video recording

Abstract

Functional movement assessment is essential in screening individuals for risk of injury and planning physiotherapy. The Landing error scoring system (LESS) is a valid and reliable paper-based tool used in assessing the risk of knee injury, which requires evaluating multiple joints across two planes using two video cameras, whilst participants land from a jump. The LESS involves of 17 items concern detecting any faulty movements (errors), then counting these errors as an overall score of the LESS. This is seldom used in physiotherapy clinics and sport fields because of the space required to place cameras, lack of obtaining related clinical movement outcomes objectively, and the privacy of the subjects. Wearable sensors which quantify accurate clinical movement outcomes and generate a 3D avatar recording could be a potential tool for movement analysis in physiotherapy. This study aimed to compare avatar to video recording in assessing jump-landing movements.