Assessing hand grip strength of upper extremities: A comparitive study

Abstract

Purpose: This study was carried aut to compare of hand grip streng~h between subjects with nonspecific neck pain tNNP) and healthy controls. Methods: Eighty participants (40 with NNP; 40 healthy controls) were evaluated using by a hand held dynameter and then compared In terms of both sides, right and left hands. A Visual Analog Scale was also used to describe pain intensity. Results: The means age of the subjects with NNP (group I) and healthy controls (group II) were 45.9±11.7 yr., 43.5±7.9 yr., respectively. The mean of daily working hours af the patients and healthy controls were 10.1±2.3 hr/week. And 10.1±2.0 hr/week, respectively. The mean of pain duration was 32.6±30.6 months, for the patients (mean of pain intensity at rest: 4.6±3.2; intensity of pain during activity: 6.6±3.0; intensity of night pain: 5.6±3.7). The mean of hand grip strength for right side in patients was 25.1 ± 13.6 kg, 28.Z± 9.9 kg for right side in healthy controls. The mean of hand grip strength for left side in patients was 24.0±11.9 kg, 26.0±9.8 kg for left side in healthy controls. The results of this study showed that the hand grip strength scores were not found to be different between the patients and healthy controls (p=O.254 for right side; p=0.419 for left side). Conclusion: The results obtained from this study indicate that pain is not important factor in terms of hand grip strength in the sample just studied in this research.