When Things Speed Up, Do More with Less

The world Just got Faster, so should your Movement Health Insights

There is no doubt that COVID has placed more stress on the world than any modern challenge. For the health of ourselves and/or our teams (your family, your work, etc.), we are all being asked to do more with less. Perhaps the largest side effect or symptom of this global pandemic is the speed at which information and landscapes are changing. Certainly, economies and politics are rapidly evolving, but so is our individual health state. COVID has created a larger emphasis, a requirement, if you will, for us all to understand our health state better NOW. And one of the most important parts of your health? Movement.

Movement underlies every chronic disease or health state, either as a cause or as a result. For example, not frequently moving can lead to obesity and/or metabolic syndrome (i.e., diabetes). Also, exercise is one of the most effective treatments for mental disorders like depression. The list goes on.

Checking your movement health state can be similar to other workflows we use now; measuring your resting heart rate or your HRV to check parasympathetic nervous system or resilience, monitoring blood glucose with a finger prick to better titrate your diet and or medication dosages.

What are we doing for monitoring our movement health that is similar to these scenarios? What can be objective, quick, and NOW?

Technology, specifically, devices and data, are the keys to better understanding our movement health. Regarding these concepts, We are constantly asked what Sparta does and, more recently, what Force Plate Machine Learning™ actually means. The first part, ‘Force Plate,’ refers to the sensor that collects movement data. ‘Machine Learning’ refers to the process with which the data from the sensor is analyzed and turned into something meaningful.

The sensor could be anything, really, but the force plate provides a rich source of data. For example, many GPS or wearable devices max out at 100Hz. Sparta’s force plates collect 10x that amount. Another example is that force plates are more practical than motion capture technology that requires significant set-up and space, even if they are markerless solutions.

The machine learning portion allows the force plate data insights to be actionable NOW, a critical value in ever-changing times like these. This analysis is what enables the mining of data to identify patterns from the individual’s assessment. More importantly, it immediately mines that assessment data and compares it against the data from over 2 million previous assessments to improve insights for the individual being assessed and all future individuals. In short, you perform a jump on a force plate, and machine learning provides individualized directions before you even land back on the ground.

In this new world, we all have a bit less to work with; less centralized team time, less travel, less buffer for error, etc. FPML™ allows you to do MORE with less, not less with less, acting as a true force multiplier.