Computing Muscle, Ligament, and Osseous Contributions to the Elbow Varus Moment During Baseball Pitching

Baseball pitching imposes a dangerous valgus load on the elbow that puts the joint at severe risk for injury. The goal of this study was to develop a musculoskeletal modeling approach to enable evaluation of muscle–tendon contributions to mitigating elbow injury risk in pitching. We implemented a fo...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Annals of biomedical engineering 2015-02, Vol.43 (2), p.404-415
Main Authors: Buffi, James H., Werner, Katie, Kepple, Tom, Murray, Wendy M.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Activation
Baseball
Baseball - physiology
Biochemistry
Biological and Medical Physics
Biomechanical Phenomena
Biomechanics
Biomedical and Life Sciences
Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering
Biomedicine
Biophysics
Classical Mechanics
Computer Simulation
Elbow Joint - physiology
Elbows
Health risks
Humans
Injuries
Ligaments
Ligaments - physiology
Male
Models, Biological
Muscle, Skeletal - physiology
Muscles
Risk
Torque
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Baseball pitching imposes a dangerous valgus load on the elbow that puts the joint at severe risk for injury. The goal of this study was to develop a musculoskeletal modeling approach to enable evaluation of muscle–tendon contributions to mitigating elbow injury risk in pitching. We implemented a forward dynamic simulation framework that used a scaled biomechanical model to reproduce a pitching motion recorded from a high school pitcher. The medial elbow muscles generated substantial, protective, varus elbow moments in our simulations. For our subject, the triceps generated large varus moments at the time of peak valgus loading; varus moments generated by the flexor digitorum superficialis were larger, but occurred later in the motion. Increasing muscle–tendon force output, either by augmenting parameters associated with strength and power or by increasing activation levels, decreased the load on the ulnar collateral ligament. Published methods have not previously quantified the biomechanics of elbow muscles during pitching. This simulation study represents a critical advancement in the study of baseball pitching and highlights the utility of simulation techniques in the study of this difficult problem.
ISSN:0090-6964
1573-9686
DOI:10.1007/s10439-014-1144-z