Quantification of functional knee joint instability by sudden balance disturbance following conservative or surgical treatment of knee ligament injury.

Governement and health providers promote the application of effective health care. Evidence Based Medecine can only be applied if effectiveness can be found. There is insuffient information about functional instabilty which refers to the patients' complaints with giving way of the knee during activities of daily living. Using a sudden balance disturbance of the knee in the standing position the presented research protocol will examine functional instability by the reaction of the body durng the control of the movement. Accelerometric registration of deceleration of the aquilibrium disturbance, electrogoniometric measurement of the movement and electromyographic registration of latency time and electromechanic delay will document the quelaity of funtional stability control in healthy and posttraumatic knee joints. The reproducibility of the method, the evaluation of the effectiveness of knee braces and the outcome of surgical and conservative therapy regimes will be studied.