Comparison of Common Methodologies for the Determination of Knee Flexor Muscle Strength.
Dan I Ogborn, Alix Bellemare, Brittany Bruinooge and 3 others
PMID 33842031WHAT IT FOUND
Knee flexor strength measured by a wall-anchored handheld dynamometer correlates with lab equipment but cannot be swapped for it.
Seated testing yields higher torque than supine, and dorsiflexing the foot increases force compared to plantarflexion.
Key findings
01Values from a fixed handheld dynamometer and an isokinetic dynamometer are correlated but have wide limits of agreement, so they should not be interchanged.
02Isometric knee flexion torque is significantly greater when the patient is seated with the foot dorsiflexed compared to supine with the foot plantarflexed.
03The NordBord device shows high test-retest reliability and moderate correlation with isokinetic dynamometry, despite measuring eccentric rather than isometric force.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTsWhat it means for OTsWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study did not include a clinician-stabilized HHD condition, so it cannot conclude whether external fixation improved agreement compared to manual stabilization. Foot position was not strictly controlled during the NordBord eccentric testing. The design did not allow for the assessment of test-retest reliability for the externally fixed HHD because body position was counterbalanced across days. Participants were healthy adults, so findings may not apply to clinical populations with pain or injury.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that a score from a fixed handheld dynamometer is equivalent to an isokinetic dynamometer score. Although the two devices correlate, the wide limits of agreement mean individual patient values can differ substantially between devices.