Immediate Effect of Cold Water Immersion on Foot and Ankle Muscle Strength and Standing Balance in Young Healthy Individuals: A Clinical Trial

Cryotherapy minimizes the effects produced by the inflammatory process and aid in recovery with reduction in pain, swelling and muscles spasm. Standing balance is an important factor when considering return to participation, because it demonstrates the function of lower limb. Lower limb muscle plays an important role in day living task (walking, chair rise, climbing stairs etc.) Among the lower limb joints ankle deserve the special attention as plantar / dorsi flexion, inversion and eversion are key movements for balance and general functional ability. In previous studies state the varied opinions on effect of cold water immersion on lower limb muscle strength and its effect on standing balance. Cold immersion, immediate effects had not yet evaluated on foot muscle strength as well as standing balance. Thus, aim to find out immediate effect of cold water immersion on ankle muscle strength and standing balance in healthy individuals using Jammer Hand Held Dynamometer. Materials and methodology: Permission was obtained from the institutional and ethical committee and total 50 (25 males, 25 females) normal healthy individuals between age 18 to 25 years who were willing to participate included in study by convenient sampling method. Single leg stance test (SLST) which is a valid and reliable tool, use to evaluate static balance in both eye open and eyes closed. To assess ankle muscle strength, Jammer hand held dynamometer which is easy to use and reliable device, was used. Data analysis: Data collection was done and statistical analysis was done by using software 14.0. Paired t-test was used for intra group comparison. Unpaired t-test was used for inter group comparison of pre and post cold water immersion for balance and ankle muscle strength assessment between males and females. Level of significance ‘p’ value < 0.001. Results: There is highly significant decrease in strength of ankle plantar/dorsiflexors, invertor and evertor muscles, post cold water immersion bilaterally as well as single leg stance tests showed highly significant diminished static balance score in both eyes open and eyes close conditions (p