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Psychophysiological Stress Response of a Paralympic Athlete During an Ultra-Endurance Event. A Case Study

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Abstract

Psychophysiological response of athletes with spinal cord injurie has not been reported yet in scientific literature. The aim of this study is to examine the psychophysiological stress response of Paralympic athlete during competitive activities. We collected the following psychophysiological measurements: anxiety-trait, anxiety-state, locus of control, perceived psychological stress, stress-copying style, rate of perceived exertion, perceived muscle pain, body temperature, forced vital capacity, blood oxygen saturation, blood glucose and lactate concentrations, isometric hand strength, cortical arousal, heart rate variability, heart rate and velocities of a female Paralympic spinal cord injured athlete in a 11 h and 44 min ultraendurance mountain event. An ultraendurance mountain even produced an increase in the sympathetic autonomous modulation, heart rate, lactate, muscular pain and rated of perceived exertion and a decrease in cortical arousal, hand strength and respiratory muscle in a spinal cord injurie female athlete during. The Paralympic athletes presented a low psychological inflexibility, high life engagement, strong internal locus of control, a low trait and state anxiety and medium perceived psychological stress. These results are consistent with the expected response during a highly stressful situation and consistent with previous findings in athletes without spinal cord injurie.

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Funding

This study was partially founded by the project 2016/UEM26.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Enfermería, Facultad de Ciencias Biomédicas y de la Salud, Universidad Europea de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Pedro Belinchón-deMiguel

  2. Department of Basic Psychology, Psychobiology and Methodology of Human Behavior, University of Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain

    Pablo Ruisoto-Palomera

  3. Faculty of Sports Sciences, Universidad Europea de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Vicente Javier Clemente-Suárez

  4. Grupo de Investigación en Cultura, Educación y Sociedad, Universidad de la Costa, Barranquilla, Colombia

    Vicente Javier Clemente-Suárez

  5. Faculty of Sport Sciences, Department of Sport Science, Calle Tajo, s/n, 28670 Villaviciosa de Odón, Madrid, Spain

    Vicente Javier Clemente-Suárez

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  1. Pedro Belinchón-deMiguel
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  2. Pablo Ruisoto-Palomera
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  3. Vicente Javier Clemente-Suárez
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Correspondence to Vicente Javier Clemente-Suárez.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Belinchón-deMiguel, P., Ruisoto-Palomera, P. & Clemente-Suárez, V.J. Psychophysiological Stress Response of a Paralympic Athlete During an Ultra-Endurance Event. A Case Study. J Med Syst 43, 70 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-019-1188-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-019-1188-6

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