康复学报 (Aug 2024)
Mechanism of Tai Chi Chuan in Improving Knee Osteoarthritis from the Perspective of Sports Biomechanics
Abstract
Knee osteoarthritis (KOA) is a chronic degenerative joint disease that occurs mostly in the elderly over the age of 60. Exercise therapy, represented by Tai Chi Chuan, has been proven to have good effective in relieving chronic pain caused by KOA. Long-term practice of Tai Chi Chuan can effectively improve knee and ankle proprioception, enhance dynamic stability and reduce the risk of falls in patients with KOA. However, there is no unified consensus on the specific mechanism of Tai Chi Chuan. Patients with KOA have obvious changes in their biomechanical characteristics. The changes in biomechanical parameters are the initial factors and pathological basis of KOA. This study explores the mechanical effects of Tai Chi Chuan on the knee joint of patients with KOA based on sports biomechanics and analyzes the potential mechanism of Tai Chi Chuan in improving KOA, in order to provide a theoretical basis for Tai Chi Chuan intervention in KOA. The theory of sports biomechanics involved in Tai Chi Chuan includes dynamic part, static part and kinematic part. From the perspective of sports biomechanics, the potential mechanism of Tai Chi Chuan to improve KOA includes four aspects: improving balance ability, improving stability (improving quadriceps muscle strength, coordinating muscle groups around the knee joint and reducing the medial load of the knee joint in patients with KOA), balancing intra-articular stress (reducing the peak stress of meniscus and cartilage, improving lower limb muscle strength and lower limb alignment) and reducing movement reaction force. However, there are still some inadequacies in Tai Chi Chuan practice, which may affect the analysis of sports biomechanics, specifically manifest in the following four aspects: (1) The training method for Tai Chi Chuan beginners may not be appropriate, which may increase the probability of muscle, ligament and joint injuries. (2) Tai Chi Chuan training movements are difficult. Subjects tend to have nonstandard movements when they learn in a short time, which easily affects the accuracy of research data. (3) The gradual increase of dropout rate is not conducive to data statistics. (4) Complete Tai Chi Chuan is time-consuming and difficult to analyze individually. At present, representative movements are mainly analyzed, and research on non-representative movements is scarce.
