Kováčiková Zuzana, Cimboláková Iveta, Čurgali Marcel, Labudová Jana, Zemková Erika
Department of Gymnastics, Dance, Fitness & Combat Sports, Faculty of Physical Education and Sport, Comenius University in Bratislava, Bratislava, Slovakia.
Institute of Physical Education and Sport, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, Košice, Slovakia.
PLoS One. 2025 Jan 2;20(1):e0308752. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0308752. eCollection 2025.
Although a lot of attention is paid to the flaws of balance training research in older adults, the low methodological quality and incomplete reporting of studies still limit the knowledge transfer between research and practice. These known shortcomings are considered also as barriers for creating recommendations for balance training in older adults. Despite the considerable efforts to improve the scientific quality of studies, such recommendations have not yet been formulated to date. Therefore, this scoping review aims (1) to analyze the literature that addresses balance training in older adults, (2) to identify and summarize gaps in the existing literature, and (3) to propose future research on this topic.
We focused on studies that evaluated the effect of balance training on balance control in apparently healthy older adults over 60 years of age.
Out of 6910 potentially relevant studies, only 26 met the eligibility criteria. The identified shortcomings were as follows: missing a priori criteria for training session attendance and leisure-time physical activities, insufficiently described exercises and training load, and inappropriately chosen tests.
Among the shortcomings of the balance training research, the insufficiently described balance training program and inappropriately chosen tests can be considered the most important. For this reason, even with an excellently designed experiment, it is almost impossible for practitioners to apply the results of such studies into practice. Therefore, researchers should pay more attention to possible users of the acquired knowledge, which is more than desirable in the case of exercise programs for older adults.
尽管老年人平衡训练研究的缺陷备受关注，但研究方法质量低下和报告不完整仍限制了研究与实践之间的知识转化。这些已知的缺点也被视为为老年人平衡训练制定建议的障碍。尽管为提高研究的科学质量付出了巨大努力，但迄今为止尚未制定出此类建议。因此，本范围综述旨在：（1）分析关于老年人平衡训练的文献；（2）识别并总结现有文献中的差距；（3）提出关于该主题的未来研究方向。
我们聚焦于评估平衡训练对60岁以上明显健康的老年人平衡控制效果的研究。
在6910项潜在相关研究中，仅有26项符合纳入标准。所发现的缺点如下：缺乏关于训练课程参与和休闲体育活动的先验标准，对练习和训练负荷的描述不足，以及测试选择不当。
在平衡训练研究的缺点中，对平衡训练计划描述不足和测试选择不当可被认为是最重要的。因此，即使实验设计精良，从业者也几乎不可能将此类研究结果应用于实践。所以，研究人员应更多地关注所获知识的可能使用者，这在针对老年人的运动计划中尤为重要。
