Visual Feedback and Weight Reduction of a Grip Strength Dynamometer Do Not Increase Reliability in Healthy Children

Study Design: Test-retest reliability study on grip strength in children. Introduction: Measuring grip strength in children is difficult because of the weight and size of the instrument, brief attention span, and possible lack of task understanding. Therefore, adaptations to the measurement protocols to improve reliability would be very important for research and clinical evaluation. Purpose: In this study, we compared the reliability of a grip strength dynamometer (Lode dynamometer, Lode BV, Groningen, The Netherlands) using three different protocols. Methods: Test-retest reliability of the American Society of Hand Therapists protocol in 104 healthy children (4-12 years) was compared with the reliability in 63 healthy children of a visual feedback protocol and a suspension protocol reducing weight of the instrument. Results: For the total group, intraclass correlation coefficients for the dominant and nondominant hands were 0.95-0.97 for all protocols, indicating that all three protocols were reliable. Conclusion: No statistically significant difference was found among the reliability of the different protocols, but the suspension protocol produced small but significantly higher force levels. Level of Evidence: Not applicable. J HAND THER. 2010;23:272-80.