Reliability of Passive Knee Joint Position Sense Test.

, Kim, Se Hwan; , Seo, Kyung Mook; , Kim, Don Kyu; , Kang, Si Hyun

Original Article

Journal of the Korean Academy of Rehabilitation Medicine 2010;34(5):560-564.

Kim, Se Hwan , Seo, Kyung Mook , Kim, Don Kyu , Kang, Si Hyun

Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Chung-Ang University College of Medicine, Korea. kmseo@cau.ac.kr

수동적 슬관절 관절 위치 감각 측정 방법의 신뢰도 평가

김세환, 서경묵, 김돈규, 강시현

중앙대학교 의과대학 재활의학교실

Abstract

Objective
To investigate the optimal number of repetition trials and to evaluate the test-retest reliability of passive knee joint position sense test.
Method
Thirty healthy subjects were tested with isokinetic machine. The knee joints were placed in starting angle of 0^o for flexion test and 90^o for extension test. To memorize the target angle, the knees were passively positioned to the target angle (30^o in flexion test and 60^o in extension test) and left hold for 10 seconds, and returned to starting position. After these processes, knee joints were passively moved toward target angles. The subjects were instructed to press button when the memorized angles were estimated to be reproduced. The tests were performed 6 times for each test angle. After 48 hours, the tests were repeated. Intra-class correlation coefficients (ICC) were calculated with the values of test and retest.
Results
There were no significant differences in absolute angular errors (AAE) between dominant and non-dominant side. The ICC value of above five repetitions of test showed excellent reliability (0.807) whereas three and four repetitions showed moderate reliabilities (0.536∼0.709).
Conclusion
From the results of this study, we suggest that five repetitions of test could be appropriate for the passive joint position sense test. (J Korean Acad Rehab Med 2010; 34: 560-564)

Key Words: Knee joint, Proprioception, Position sense, Reliability