TY - JOUR A2 - Zaffaroni, Mauro AU - Edwards, Erin M. AU - Kegelmeyer, Deborah A. AU - Kloos, Anne D. AU - Nitta, Manon AU - Raza, Danya AU - Nichols-Larsen, Deborah S. AU - Fritz, Nora E. PY - 2020 DA - 2020/09/08 TI - Backward Walking and Dual-Task Assessment Improve Identification of Gait Impairments and Fall Risk in Individuals with MS SP - 6707414 VL - 2020 AB - Background. Individuals with multiple sclerosis (MS) experience deficits in motor and cognitive domains, resulting in impairment in dual-task walking ability. The goal of this study was to compare performance of forward walking and backward walking in single- and dual-task conditions in persons with MS to age- and sex-matched healthy controls. We also examined relationships between forward and backward walking to cognitive function, balance, and retrospective fall reports. Methods. All measures were collected in a single session. A 2×2×2 mixed model ANOVA was used to compare differences in forward and backward walking in single- and dual-task conditions between MS and healthy controls. Spearman correlations were used to examine relationships between gait and cognitive function, falls, and balance. Results. Eighteen individuals with relapsing-remitting MS and 14 age- and sex-matched healthy controls participated. Backward walking velocity revealed significant differences between groups for both single-task (p=0.015) and dual-task (p=0.014) conditions. Persons with MS demonstrated significant differences between single- and dual-task forward and backward walking velocities (p=0.023; p=0.004), whereas this difference was only apparent in the backward walking condition for healthy controls (p=0.004). In persons with MS, there were significant differences in double support time between single- and dual-task conditions in both backward (p<0.001) and forward (p=0.001) directions. More falls at six months were significantly associated with shorter backward dual-task stride length (r=0.490; p=0.046) and slower velocity (r=0.483; p=0.050). Conclusion. Differences in MS and age- and sex-matched healthy controls are more pronounced during backward compared to forward walking under single- and dual-task conditions. Future work with a larger sample size is needed to validate the clinical utility of backward walking and dual-task assessments and mitigate the limited sensitivity of the current dual-task assessments that primarily rely upon forward walking. SN - 2090-2654 UR - https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/6707414 DO - 10.1155/2020/6707414 JF - Multiple Sclerosis International PB - Hindawi KW - ER -