Health Features of Girls Professionally Engaged in Ballet

One of the priority tasks of modern Russia is to preserve the health of the younger generation; specialists in various fields of healthcare are tasked with preventing the development of pathological conditions in the child population. For a long time, the impact of professional ballet classes on a child’s organism has remained poorly studied, despite the fact that ballet is an art form that is unnatural to human nature, and the start of training for it occurs during adolescence. The purpose of this research was to examine the health characteristics of female students at specialized ballet schools. In 2022-2023, a survey of girls aged 15 to 18 years (n=120) was conducted at the Vaganova Ballet Academy; the control group consisted of 86 girls who did not have professional physical activity (ballet, sports). The data were processed using statistical methods of the Python programming language library; the analyzed parameters were presented using descriptive statistics, the Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, one-way analysis of variance, and post-hoc tests. Significant differences in weight, BMI and history of musculoskeletal injuries were found in the study groups (p< 0.01). The ballerinas more often report a feeling of lack of energy (87.8%), the presence of syncopal states (73.17%). Reliable differences were noted in the duration (M=4; SD=0.983) and total duration of classes per week (M=26; SD=6.542) in the main group compared to similar indicators (M=1; SD=3.046 and M=3; SD=3.078) in the control group, p< 0.01. Thus, there are a number of significant changes in the health of girls professionally involved in ballet, which in the future may lead to the development of persistent pathological conditions.