The effect of a three week sports training programme on the coordinative ability of asthmatic children

We set out to evaluate the coordinative ability of asthmatic children and to find out how this component of physical fitness is affected by a training programme of a short duration. Seventeen asthmatic children participated in the study. Their ages ranged from 9.0 to 14.5 years. Their mean weight (+/- SD) was 44.89 +/- 14.94 kg and mean height (+/- SD) was 153.21 +/- 9.92 cm. Coordination was measured using the Body Coordination Test for Children (BCTC) developed by Kiphard and Schilling in 1974. The subjects participated three times a week in a sports programme. The results were analysed using the Wilcoxon test for dependent variables and regression analysis. We noted a significant improvement at the end of the training programme (p < 0.05), although there was no correlation between attendance and improvement in performance. Our results do not support the general view that asthmatics are unfit. We concluded that asthmatic children are not generally unfit, and that their coordinative ability can be improved within a relatively short time of training.