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ARTICLE

The Differences in Lower Extremity Joints Energy Dissipation Strategy during Landing between Athletes with Symptomatic Patellar Tendinopathy (PT) and without Patellar Tendinopathy (UPT)

Datao Xu¹, Zhenghui Lu¹, Siqin Shen², Gusztáv Fekete², Ukadike C. Ugbolue³, Yaodong Gu^1,*

1 Faculty of Sports Science, Ningbo University, Ningbo, 315211, China
2 Savaria Institute of Technology, Faculty of Informatics, Eötvös Loránd University, Szombathely, 9700, Hungary
3 School of Health and Life Sciences, University of the West of Scotland, Scotland, G72 0LH, UK

* Corresponding Author: Yaodong Gu. Email:

Molecular & Cellular Biomechanics 2021, 18(2), 107-118. https://doi.org/10.32604/mcb.2021.015453

Received 19 December 2020; Accepted 25 February 2021; Issue published 09 April 2021

Abstract

Patellar tendinopathy is a clinical symptom of patellar tendons characterized by local pain in the front of the knee joint. It is common among basketball and volleyball players. Patients with patellar tendinopathy may exhibit different landing strategies during landing compared to healthy individuals. The purpose of this study was to compare the differences in lower limb joint energy dissipation (eccentric work) values for the symptomatic patellar tendinopathy (PT) athletes and no patellar tendinopathy (UPT) athletes during single-leg landing. A total of 26 (PT: 13, UPT:13) semi-professional male basketball and volleyball player’s kinetic data were collected during the landing phases. Joint work was calculated by the integral of joint power over time. In this study, the result showed that the ankle joint means energy dissipation (p < 0.001) and total energy dissipation (p < 0.001) of PT were significantly greater than UPT. Compared to the UPT athletes, the PT athletes showed smaller knee joint mean energy dissipation (p = 0.002) and contribution to total energy dissipation (p < 0.001) during the landing stance. Meanwhile, there were no differences in hip joint contribution to total energy dissipation (p = 0.523) and lower limb total energy dissipation (p = 0.127). A deeper understanding of each joint’s energy dissipation contribution ratio between UPT and PT during landing can provide clues that reveal the biomechanical mechanism of PT athletes landing. Further study should choose a larger sample size to more comprehensively reveal the energy dissipation strategy of PT during landing.

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