Muscular and kinematic features in speed skaters indicate a task-specific dystonia

Objective: Skater's cramp is a movement disorder in speed skaters. We investigated whether affected ska-ters matched the disease profile of task-specific dystonia, specifically whether there was evidence of mal-adaptive muscle activity occurring simultaneously with aberrant movements (jerking). We further examined different skating intensities, positing no change would be more indicative of task-specific dys-tonia.Methods: We analyzed video, kinematic and muscle activity in 14 affected skaters. We measured the angular velocity and electromyographic activity of normalized speed skating strokes using one dimen-sional statistical non-parametric mapping. Skaters were matched with comparably skilled controls, and filled out a bespoke clinical questionnaire.Results: Skaters' impacted leg showed over-activation in the peroneus longus, tibialis anterior and gas-trocnemius that coincided with higher foot movement compared to their healthy leg and controls. This pattern persisted regardless of skating intensity. Clinical features indicated it was task-specific and pain-less with common trigger factors including stress, equipment change, and falling. Conclusions: We showed aberrant muscular and kinematic activity in a movement disorder in speed ska-ters indicative of task-specific dystonia.Significance: Understanding skater's cramp as a task-specific dystonia could reduce the damage that mis-diagnosis and unsuccessful invasive operations have caused. Our quantitative method has value in testing future treatment efficacy.(c) 2023 International Federation of Clinical Neurophysiology. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).