The Comparison of High-Risk Patterns of ACL Injury in Dominant and Non-Dominant Legs of Males and Females during Cutting Maneuver

From injury risk perspective, a change in body direction during fast sport movements is always noticeable while ACL injury is an important mechanism. This research aimed at comparing high-risk patterns of ACL injury in dominant and non-dominant legs of males and females during cutting maneuver. Participants were national and club squash players including 13 females (mean age: 23.04±6.6 yr, height: 163.3±5.4 cm, weight: 61.60±5 kg) and 13 males (mean age: 24.7±4.1 yr, height: 179.9±5.8cm, weight: 78.8±7.8 kg). In order to measure knee flexion, trunk flexion, trunk lateral flexion and knee valgus angles during cutting maneuver and in two phases of initial foot contact with the ground and mid stance, cutting maneuver with dominant and non-dominant legs was analyzed. After the markers had been installed, cutting maneuver was recorded by Casio Exilim camera with 300 Hz frequency and the recorded movements were analyzed by WinAnalyze software (Version D34-1). SPSS (version 20) and Paired-samples t test were used to compare the angles obtained by the motion analysis of dominant and non-dominant legs. The results indicated that knee and trunk joint angles during cutting maneuver had a significant difference between dominant and non-dominant legs of females while this difference was significant in two parameters of knee and trunk flexion at initial contact among males (P􀂕0.05). These results showed that high-risk patterns of ACL injury had a higher rate of incidence in cutting maneuver with non-dominant leg. Thus ACL injury risk is higher in the cutting maneuver with non-dominant leg than dominant leg.