The TJA is a quick assessment of repetitive tuck jump performance, lasting 10 seconds, yet requiring a high level of effort, which may result in fatigue. The tuck jump assessment (TJA) was created as 1 such “clinician friendly” tool to identify lower extremity landing technique flaws during a plyometric activity ( 18,19). It can also be time consuming to screen athletes individually using high-speed motion capturing systems to evaluate biomechanical deficits therefore, clinician friendly screening tools are being sought after. Not all clinical settings can afford expensive biomechanical equipment to provide screening of athletes. Unfortunately, some of these tools are very expensive and can be time consuming. Several tests have been reported to help identify risk factors for ACL injury in collegiate athletes ( 17).
Due to the length of missed time from competition and the understanding of what factors may predispose an athlete to ACL injuries, medical personnel have started to be proactive about screening to prevent injuries. This may be because of a decrease in neuromuscular control before or during landing.
Recent research has suggested that athletes have an increased risk of ACL injury when landing in a knee valgus position ( 2,13). There are several mechanisms of injury that can cause an ACL tear, but nearly 70% of these injuries are because of noncontact mechanisms ( 2,16). These injuries can severely affect an athlete's season and possibly playing career, as nearly 50% do not return to sport after 2 years ( 1). Furthermore, 88% of these injuries resulted in a loss of practice or playing time of at least 10 days or more ( 14). In the collegiate setting, anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuries account for 3–5% of all injuries sustained by athletes ( 14).
These results may question the use of a single score, a unidimensional construct, of the TJA for injury screening. The results differ from the 5 modifiable risk categories as previously suggested. The 3 factors were defined as fatigue, distal landing pattern, and proximal control. The EFA suggested a 3 factor model accounting for 46% of the variance. The present study is a psychometric analysis of the TJA technique flaws to measure the internal structure using an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) using data from collegiate athletes ( n = 90) and a general college cohort ( n = 99). Research has not investigated the psychometric properties of the TJA technique flaws or the modifiable risk factors. Through expert consensus, these 10 technique flaws have been grouped into 5 modifiable risk factors: ligament dominance, quadriceps dominance, leg dominance or residual injury deficits, trunk dominance (“core” dysfunction), and technique perfection. Technique flaws are then summed up for an overall score. There are 10 technique flaws that are assessed as either having the apparent deficit or not during the TJA. The tuck jump assessment (TJA) was created as a “clinician friendly” tool to identify lower extremity landing technique flaws during a plyometric activity. J Strength Cond Res 31(3): 653–659, 2017-Due to the high rate of noncontact lower extremity injuries that occur in the collegiate setting, medical personnel are implementing screening mechanisms to identify those athletes that may be at risk for certain injuries before starting a sports season. Tuck Jump Assessment: An exploratory factor analysis in a college age population. Lininger, MR, Smith, CA, Chimera, NJ, Hoog, P, and Warren, M.
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