Force plate methodologies applied to injury profiling and rehabilitation in sport: a scoping review protocol

Abstract

Musculoskeletal injuries are a common health problem among sporting populations. Such injuries come with a high financial burden to the involved organisations and can have a detrimental impact on the career attainment of injured individuals. Force plates are now a common tool available to sport and exercise science and medicine professionals to enable them to profile injury risk predisposition and modulate the rehabilitation process within sporting environments. This is because contemporary force plate technology is portable and affordable and often comes with software that enables the automatic and immediate feedback of test variables to key stakeholders. However, to our knowledge, to date, there has been no comprehensive review of the scientific literature pertaining to clinical applications of force plate technology. Therefore, this article presents a protocol and a methodological framework to perform a scoping review to identify and map the available scientific literature in which force plates have been applied to the injury profiling and rehabilitation of athletes. The specific aims of the scoping review are 1) to identify and describe the force plate tests, methodologies, and metrics used to screen for injury risk and guide the return of injured athletes to full-time training and competition, 2) to identify potential trends and/or differences by participants’ age, sex, and/or level of performance in tests, methodologies, and metrics selected, and 3) to identify key gaps in the existing evidence base and new questions that should be addressed in future research. The global aim of the scoping review is to improve practitioner decision-making around force plate test and variable selection when applied to the injury prevention and rehabilitation of sporting populations.