Tehran University Medical Journal

Background: Sports injuries of the knee joint are very common. There are both contact injuries and non-contact injuries. Contractile injuries may be due to an impairment of the knee joint position sense or a decrease of the quadriceps muscle strength. Using a Kinesio taping method may decrease this impairment. The aim of the current study was to assess the effect of direction and tension of Kinesio taping of the quadriceps muscle on repositioning sense of the knee joint and maximum concentric and eccentric torque of the knee extensors.
Methods: Twenty-one recreationally active healthy males, determined by convenient non-probability sampling method, participated in this quazi-experimental study. The tests were performed in biomechanics laboratory of School of Rehabilitation of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Iran, between July to November 2017. They visited biomechanics laboratory 5 sessions. The first session was for familiarization with the main tests and signing an informed consent form. For 2 through 5 sessions, one of each Kinesio tape tension approaches of 100, 115 and 140 percent (origin to insertion direction) and 100 percent (insertion to origin direction) was randomly applied on the quadriceps muscle. Active and passive repositioning sense of the knee joint at 60-degree flexion and maximum concentric and eccentric torque of the knee extensors of the dominant extremity before and after Kinesio taping were measured using a Biodex System 3 isokinetic dynamometer (Biodex Medical Systems, Shirley, NY, USA). Order of measuring active and passive repositioning sense and maximum concentric and eccentric torque of the knee extensors were randomly selected.
Results: Origin to insertion Kinesio taping method with tension of 100, 115 and 140 percent significantly decreased means of active and passive repositioning sense errors (P< 0.05) and changed means of maximum concentric and eccentric torque of the quadriceps muscle (P< 0.05). But, insertion to origin Kinesio taping did not change significantly any parameter (P> 0.05).
Conclusion: According to the results, Kinesio taping could influence on repositioning sense of the knee joint at 60-degree knee flexion. Maximum concentric and eccentric extensor torques was also increased.

Background: Foot posture is proposed as an important factor that may affect the lower limb alignment. Variations from the normal foot posture may contribute to musculoskeletal injuries of the lower extremity especially knee joint. Considering variations in foot posture and knee joint alignment, this study aimed to assess and compare pennation angles of the vastus medialis oblique (VMO), vastus medialis (VM) and vastus lateralis (VL) in women with pronated foot posture and normal ones.
Methods: This observational, case-control study was carried out on 31 women with pronated foot posture (foot posture index: 6-12) and 31 women with normal foot posture (foot posture index: 0-5) in the age range of 18 to 35 years old.  Participants were recruited from female students of university communities using Non-probability Sampling method. Sampling was carried out from September 2019 up to February 2020 at the biomechanics laboratory of rehabilitation faculty of Tehran University of Medical Sciences. The pennation angle of VMO, VM and VL muscles was measured by using two dimensional. B-mode ultrasound imaging (USI) .A 7.5MHz linear transducer with 50mm footprint was used for the measurements. The ultrasound images were analyzed using Image J software. Three longitudinal scans were captured for each muscle pennation angle while the probe removed between each scan.
Results: The results of this study showed that there is no statistical significant difference between the pennation angles of  VMO, VM and VL in women’s foot posture compare to the normal ones (P>0.05).
However, the results of intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of USI measurements showed “good” intrarater reliability for VMO (ICC=0.88), VM (ICC=0.87) and VL (ICC= 0.77) pennation angles.
Conclusion: Based on the results of this study, the pennation angle of knee extensor muscles (VMO, VM, and VL), which was measured in non-weight bearing, is not different in young women with pronated foot compared to the normal ones. In addition, USI demonstrated good reliability for measuring VMO, VM and VL pennation angles.