Abstract
The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of postural control on unstable surfaces for falls of the community-dwelling elderly. The subjects were 55 community-dwelling elderly, and their fall history for 1 year was collected: the fall group and the non-fall group. For the measurement of postural control, posturography with an exclusive rubber foam was used, and measurements of the conditions with the rubber foam and without the foam were combined with the eyes opened and closed. The measurement parameters included the circumferential areas, the root mean square areas and the locus length per unit areas. The Rombergʼs quotient of each measurement parameter was analyzed. None of the measurement parameters showed any significant differences for the fall history. The measurement parameters of the fall group tended to show higher scores in comparison with the non-fall group, but the non-fall group showedhighscoresfor the Rombergʼs quotient only in the condition with the rubber foam. This finding indicates that evaluating postural control by using posturography does not show the influence of posture on falls. The fall group uses visual dominance for posture control, and the somatosensory of the lower limbs is decreased in comparison to the non-fall group.
