Reliability of the hand held dynamometer in measuring muscle strength in people with interstitial lung disease

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the inter-rater and intra-rater reliability of the hand held dynamometer in measuring muscle strength in people with interstitial lung disease (ILD).

Design: Test retest reliability of hand-held dynamometry for elbow flexor and knee extensor strength between two independent raters and two testing sessions.

Setting: Physiotherapy department within a tertiary hospital.

Participants: Thirty participants with ILD of varying aetiology were included. Twenty participants completed the inter-rater reliability protocol (10 idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, mean (SD) age 73 (10) years, 11 male) and 21 participants completed the intra-rater reliability protocol (10 idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, mean age 71 (10) years, 11 male).

Main outcome measures: Mean muscle strength (kg). Agreement between the two raters and testing sessions was analyzed using Bland-Altman plots and reliability was estimated using intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC).

Results: For elbow flexor strength there was a mean difference between raters of -0.6kg (limits of agreement (LOA) -5.6 to 4.4kg) and within raters of -0.3kg (LOA -2.8 to 2.3kg). The ICCs were 0.95 and 0.98, respectively. For knee extensor strength there was a mean difference between raters of -1.5kg (LOA -6.9 to 3.9kg) and within raters of -0.7kg (LOA -3.9 to 2.4kg). The ICCs were 0.95 and 0.97, respectively.

Conclusions: Hand-held dynamometry is reliable in measuring elbow flexor and knee extensor strength in people with ILD.

Keywords: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis; Interstitial lung diseases; Muscle strength; Muscle strength dynamometer; Reliability and validity.