The Kerlan-Jobe Orthopaedic Clinic Shoulder & Elbow Score used as a Patient-Reported Outcome Measure for the Youth and High School Aged Baseball Athlete.
Ryan Monti, Alicia Fernandez-Fernandez
PMID 35949373WHAT IT FOUND
The Kerlan-Jobe score separates youth baseball players throwing with pain from those without.
A score below 68.6 indicates pain with throwing, while a score above 68.6 indicates no pain. This provides a specific threshold for clinicians assessing young overhead athletes.
Key findings
01Youth baseball players reporting pain had significantly lower Kerlan-Jobe scores (mean 61.9) compared to pain-free players (mean 88.7).
02A cut-score of 68.6 points reliably distinguishes between young athletes throwing with pain and those throwing without pain.
03There was no significant difference in Kerlan-Jobe scores across age subgroups (10-13 vs 14-18 years) within the pain and no-pain groups.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
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What it does not show
The study used purposive sampling rather than random sampling, which limits how widely the results can be applied to all youth baseball players. The age range of 10 to 18 years includes a wide variety of developmental stages and reading levels, which may affect how consistently patients interpret the visual analog scale questions. There was significant overlap in scores between the two groups due to high variability in the pain group, meaning the cut-score is a guide but not a perfect diagnostic tool. The study only included male baseball athletes, so the results do not apply to female softball players or other overhead sports.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not treat the 68.6 cut-score as a definitive diagnostic test for pain. While it separates the groups statistically, the wide variability in scores among those with pain means some athletes with pain may score above the threshold and some without pain may score below it.