Second-year DPT students Kaleigh Jenkins, Danielle Essex and Ginny Shafer shared their research findings on Bharatanatyam dancers at the Winston-Salem Dance Medicine Conference.
Elon DPT students Kaleigh Jenkins, Danielle Essex and Ginny Shafer were invited to present their ongoing research on the biomechanical and musculoskeletal characteristics of dancers performing Bharatanatyam, a classical Indian dance that involves high-frequency dynamic movements, at the Winston-Salem Dance Medicine Conference. The researchers compared the biomechanics of different tasks like walking, jumping, and dance in the Bharatanatyam dance practitioners and also compared the performance, strength and range of motion between children and adult practitioners.
As part of the conference held in Winston-Salem, Aparna Pisharody from the Svasti School of Dance and her team were invited to perform a dance for the attendees to get a sense of Bharatanatyam. Pisharody has collaborated with Professor Srikant Vallabhajosula and Assistant Professor Jack Magill, faculty in the Physical Therapy Education department along with the three students for the ongoing research study. This project has been supported by the Elon Faculty Research and Development funds.
The Winston-Salem Dance Medicine Conference is a multi-disciplinary educational opportunity for physicians, allied health professionals, dancers, dance instructors, and students to review (or learn anew) the fundamentals of dance medicine, including unique biomechanics, genre-specific considerations, and social/psychological demands that may influence performance and injury risk.
