Interexaminer Reliability Of The Deltoid And Psoas Muscle Test

Henry Pollard, DC, PhD, a Bronwyn Lakay, MChiro,b Frances Tucker, MChiro,b Brett Watson, MChiro, b and Peter Bablis, DCb
J Manipulative Physiol Ther. 2005 Jan;28(1):52-6

Abstract:

Objective:
To determine if 2 practitioners of differing skill levels could reliably agree on the presence of a weak or strong deltoid or psoas muscle.

Study Design: 
Interexaminer reliability study of 2 common muscle tests.
Main Outcome Measures: Cohen j (unweighted) scores, observer agreement, and 95% confidence intervals (CIs).

Results: 
The results showed that an experienced and a novice practitioner have good agreement when using repeated muscle test procedures on the deltoid (j 0.62) and the psoas (j 0.67).

Conclusions:
The manual muscle test procedures using the anterior deltoid or psoas showed good interexaminer reliability when used by an experienced and a novice user. These techniques may be used between practitioners in multidoctor assessment/management programs. (J Manipulative Physiol Ther 2005;28:52-56)

Key Indexing Terms: Chiropractic; Muscle Test; Reliability; Psoas Muscle; Deltoid Muscle