Exploring pregnancy and postpartum experiences among geographically diverse elite athletes: A qualitative study.

Objectives: Female athletes who experience childbirth during their athletic careers can expect to return to elite sports postpartum and perform at a comparable or improved level. However, mothering athletes often encounter significant barriers when re-entering elite sports. The aim of this study was to explore the experiences of a geographically diverse group of mothering athletes who returned to elite sports after childbirth.

Reliability of lower limb strength assessment in female team sport athletes.

Background: Lower limb injury rates have increased dramatically in line with increased female sport participation levels. Muscle strength is a modifiable lower limb injury risk factor, guiding performance monitoring and rehabilitation.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the test-retest reliability of isokinetic and isometric lower limb peak torque to body mass of muscles acting on the hip, knee, and ankle in female team sport athletes.

Developing and Planning a Protocol for Implementing Health Promoting Animal Assisted Interventions (AAI) in a Tertiary Health Setting.

The Ottawa Charter identifies that multiple levels of government, non-government, community, and other organizations should work together to facilitate health promotion, including in acute settings such as hospitals. We outline a method and protocol to achieve this, namely an Action Research (AR) framework for an Animal Assisted Intervention (AAI) in a tertiary health setting. Dogs Offering Support after Stroke (DOgSS) is an AR study at a major tertiary referral hospital.

Reliability of the running vertical jump test in female team sport athletes.

Unlabelled: Injury rates to the lower limb have increased over the past 40 years, coinciding with increases in female sport participation rates. Sport specific tests such as the running vertical jump (RVJ) are utilised for injury risk profiling, however the test-retest reliability is unknown.

Objectives: The aim of this study was to investigate the test-retest reliability of the thorax, pelvis and lower limb joint angular kinematics and kinetics for the RVJ test in female team sport athletes.

Assistance dogs in occupational therapy practice: A survey of Australian occupational therapists' experiences and recommendations.

Introduction: Assistance dogs perform multiple tasks to support people with disabilities and bring various benefits. Occupational therapists play a key role in assessing or referring clients for assistive technology, which includes assistance dogs. However, little is known about Australian occupational therapists' experiences with assistance dogs and how they perceive their roles in this area of practice.

Changes in power assessed by the Wingate Anaerobic Test following downhill running.

Few studies have examined the effects of eccentric exercise-induced muscle damage on power despite power being a key performance variable in a number of sporting events. The aim of this study was to examine changes in anaerobic power (30-second Wingate Test), isometric strength of the knee extensors and flexors, muscle soreness, and plasma creatine kinase (CK) activity following downhill running. Eight men performed a 40-minute downhill (-7%) run on a treadmill, and measurements were taken on 6 occasions (2 baseline and 0.