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Aims: This study examined how vision, base of support (BOS) and surface compliance affected postural sway and electromyography (EMG) activity of hip and ankle muscles during eight balance training tasks in young adults. Methods: Postural sway and EMG activity of gluteus maximus (GMAX), gluteus medius (GMED), tibialis anterior (TA), and medial gastrocnemius (GAST) were measured during eight balance tasks with eyes open or closed, feet in tandem or apart, and on foam or a firm surface. Results: Postural sway and EMG activity of hip and ankle muscles were significantly affected by the alteration of vision, surface compliance or BOS during eight balance tasks (PConclusions: Balance exercises may be progressed according to the rank of the task’s difficulty by increasing the number of sensory factors altered in a balance task. There was significant recruitment of hip and ankle muscles in the balance tasks indicating the importance of these muscles in postural control.

Background It is well established that there is a reduction in the skin blood flow (SBF) in response to heat with age and diabetes. While it is known that high BMI creates a stress on the cardiovascular system and increases the risk of all cause of morbidity and mortality, little is known of the effect of high BMI on SBF response to heat. Since diabetes is associated with age and a higher BMI, the interrelationship between age, BMI and SBF needs to be investigated to better understand the contribution diabetes alone has to endothelial impairment. Material/Methods This study examined the SBF to heat in young and old people with low and high BMI and people with diabetes with high BMI to determine the contribution these variables have on SBF. Subjects were ten young and older people with BMI 20 and ten subjects with diabetes with BMI >20. The SBF response, above the quadriceps, was determined during a 6 minutes exposure to heat at 44°C. Results Even in young people, SBF after the stress of heat exposure was reduced in subjects with a high BMI. The effect of BMI was greatest in young people and lowest in older people and people with diabetes; in people with diabetes, BMI was a more significant variable than diabetes in causing impairment of blood flow to heat. BMI, for example, was responsible for 49% of the reduction in blood flow after stress heat exposure (R=−0.7) while ageing only accounted for 16% of the blood flow reduction (R=−0.397). Conclusions These results would suggest the importance of keeping BMI low not only in people with diabetes to minimize further circulatory vascular damage, but also in young people to diminish long term circulatory vascular compromise.