Introduction
The Dancer Wellness Project (DWP) is a
consortium of organizations
that promote dancer health, wellness, education, and research through the
implementation of dance screening, exposure tracking, and injury surveillance.
This goal is to promote injury prevention, career longevity, effective and
efficient training, and assist dancers, dance educators, and medical
professional who interface with dancers. The main goal of the DWP is to provide
the technological infrastructures and other resources needed to facilitate and
support the myriad projects of participating organizations/affiliates.
Central to the DWP is its commonly-shared website which provides the mechanisms
for data entry and analysis, the generation of unique personalized profiles with
recommended cross training protocols, customized self-reported data collection
modules, coded data export for research purposes, and an automated
system to collect extrinsic risk factors data. The DWP website provides linkages
between screening, exposure,
and injury data and other various data modules.
Though initially developed as a teaching tool, the DWP website now facilitates
multi-institutional research collaborations as well as provides an extensive
database for many affiliates. Robust data protection mechanisms have been
developed including the utilization of industry-standard data encryption of
transmitted data, multilevel administrative accounts, and redundant backup
systems.
The DWP website, which gets thousands of hits monthly, serves hundreds of users
around the world, supports multiple dancers health and research initiatives, and
is proving to be a valuable resource for many internet users seeking dance
wellness related information and resources. There are a number of feature-rich
modules to the system that are grouped into major categories, several of which
are summarized here.
Back to Top
Screening
A 'screen' is the collection of data about a particular dancer including information
such as a dancer's strength, flexibility, and technique. These data are often
used as teaching tools for the dancer, may be used for research projects, or
part of a medical inventory used by medical professionals working
with dancers. To support the multiple screening initiatives, customized
screening forms
can be created using the nearly 200 data collection modules,
many of which have online error checking to help minimize data entry errors and
online video instructions
to demonstrate how the tests are conducted. The use of
commonly available internet enabled devices such as notebook computers, computer
tablets, and mobile devices during the screening process eliminates the need for
paper forms and allows dancers and affiliates to gain access to data and
profiles almost immediately after a screen.
Back to Top
Exposure Tracking
Whereas screening data provides information about the intrinsic characteristics
of a particular dancer, exposure data provides information about how often the
dancer is actively involved in dance related activities and what risk factors
are involved with that activity. The exposure tracking module allows users to not
only collect information on how long and how many times a dancer is involved
with dance related activities, but also data related to other factors such as
equipment and environment. This system supports both time-based and
event-based exposure reporting methodologies and provides extensive detail about
other exposure variables. To aid in streamlining regular (daily) data entry of
this large data set, these variables are grouped into various customizable
definitions which are then used in establishing the online class and rehearsal
schedule of events. At the start of each event, the designated teacher or
director receives email notification about the dance event including a
list of dancers. The individual simply replies to the email (without having to
type anything), and the DWP will do all the necessary data entry automatically.
Back to Top
Injury Surveillance
Unlike screenings and exposure tracking, which are typically a single event,
injuries have a 'life span' (onset through resolution). The DWP allows for the
monitoring of injuries through the duration of the injury cycle and supports
multiple definitions of injury, e.g. time loss (how much time a dancer is unable
to participate in dance activities), function loss (how much impairment to
motion they experience), financial loss (how much financial impact is involved).
The automated email system allows designated users, such as teachers,
directors, or health professionals, to be kept abreast of various
open injury cases and provides reminders to follow up with additional data
entry. Various graphs available in the summary profiles (see below) display new
and open injury cases, and the use of customized survey modules can be used to
prompt dancers for additional self-reported information regarding their injury
including activity levels.
Back to Top
Self-Reported Data
Some information used by the DWP can only be provided by the dancer and
affiliates can custom design various questionnaires to collect this
information. The DWP can also automatically email reminders to the dancers
to notify them that there is a request for this additional information.
Examples of these self-reported data modules include perceived exertion
during a class/rehearsal, intake surveys, mental health surveys, and even
activity levels in class/rehearsal.
Back to Top
Profiles
The DWP develops a unique profile for each dancer drawing upon all of the data
input systems: screening, exposure, injury, and self-reported.
(See sample)
For the dancer, these profiles also aid in the creation of a
cross-training profile with recommended exercise programs to address cited
areas. Video demonstrations of many of the exercises are available along with
anatomical imagery and descriptive text of all musculature involved/affected.
The comprehensive cross-linked system provides connections to the various
resources available.
Additionally, multiple dancer profiles can be grouped to help summarize trends or
averages across different dancer groups. These summary profiles are also useful
in creating a general profile for an entire group.
Back to Top
Security
The concerns that professional dancers have about disclosure of health related
information are well known therefore, security and confidentiality of all data is
critically factored into the development and operation of the website. Extensive
security protocols have been implemented to protect the confidentiality of all
data and are compliant with US Federal Laws governing the use of data used with
human subjects research.
The website utilizes
SSL,
an industry-standard data encryption transport
mechanism, with all transmissions of sensitive data. Dancers have access to the
website via secured, password protected accounts. Administrators are able to
access data for all the dancers in their respective institution however,
cross-institutional access is not available – users at one institution cannot
gain access to data from another institution.
There are multiple levels of security roles and administrators at each affiliate can use these
roles to define who within their organization has access to what kind of data.
Back to Top
Internationalization
With all relevant display of data and data entry, appropriate units of measures
are used. Those dance institutions in countries where the metric system is used
will have data fields in centimeters and kilograms as opposed to inches and
pounds.
Back to Top