Reliability of the EasyAngle® for Assessing Hip Range of Motion in Healthy Children.
Elana Duffy, Maria Wells, Alan Miller and 2 others
PMID 38179581WHAT IT FOUND
The EasyAngle digital goniometer showed good to excellent reliability for measuring hip motion in healthy children aged 5 to 10.
It is a viable alternative to manual goniometers for tracking range of motion in pediatric sports exams, provided clinicians follow a standardized protocol.
Key findings
01Intrarater reliability for all five hip motions was good to excellent, with ICC values ranging from 0.807 to 0.971.
02Interrater reliability between two different examiners was also good to excellent, with ICC values ranging from 0.778 to 0.911.
03Female participants demonstrated significantly greater hip flexion and abduction range of motion compared to male participants.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
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What it does not show
The sample was small (20 children) and homogeneous, with 75% of the hip joints belonging to Black or African American participants, limiting generalizability to other ethnic groups. Participants were healthy children; the device's reliability in children with musculoskeletal or neuromuscular conditions was not tested. Raters were student physical therapists, not fully licensed practitioners, which may affect how results translate to experienced clinician practice. Fatigue and difficulty relaxing may have affected the accuracy of later measurements, particularly for external rotation, which was measured last.
Declared interests
The authors state that the researchers underwent device training with a Meloq representative. No other financial conflicts or funding sources are explicitly declared in the provided text.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume these reliability findings apply to children with hip pathology or neuromuscular conditions, as this study only included healthy children. Also, do not use the normative values as a universal standard without considering the specific ethnic makeup of the sample, which was predominantly Black or African American.