A kinematic study of the upper-limb motion of wheelchair basketball shooting in tetraplegic adults.

Kinematic aspects of the reduced shooting ability of tetraplegic (TP) wheelchair basketball players were investigated and compared with those of able-bodied (AB) basketball players. TP showed significantly smaller values for the vertical component of ball release velocity (4.26 (degree/s) versus 5.45 (degree/s)) and maximum wrist flexion angular velocity (878.4 (degree/s) versus 1445.9 degrees) than AB. Moreover, for a specific shoulder horizontal adduction motion, a larger range of shoulder abduction motion and larger displacements of the right shoulder were observed in TP. The reduced ball velocity of TP subjects with lesions at the C7 to C8 levels depended on an insufficient wrist flexion angular velocity, where dysfunction of available musculature may be a causal determinant. Further, the specific motions observed in TP subjects most likely maximize the function of available musculature, thereby partially compensating for the dysfunction of the wrist flexor muscles and contributing to resultant ball release velocity.