Quantitative Assessment of Lumbar Paraspinal Muscle Endurance

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

Summer 2003

Publication Title

Journal of Athletic Training

Keywords

reliability, variability, lumbar muscular endurance

Abstract

Objective:

To evaluate the reliability and variability of repeated measurements of dynamic and static lumbar muscle endurance.

Design and Setting:

Participants performed an isometric lumbar-extension strength test followed by 2 trials of 4 separate lumbar muscular-endurance tests (with a 24-hour rest period between tests). Data were collected at a university musculoskeletal research laboratory.

Subjects:

Eight healthy, physically active volunteers (5 men, 3 women; age = 25.9 ± 4.3 years; height = 169.0 ± 4.6 cm; mass = 73.9 ± 33.1 kg) participated in this investigation.

Measurements:

We initially tested each participant's isometric lumbar-extension peak torque on a lumbar-extension dynamometer. Static (holding time) and dynamic (repetitions) lumbar-endurance tests were subsequently performed on the lumbar-extension dynamometer and a horizontal roman chair.

Results:

Interclass reliability was high for all endurance tests completed (r = 0.91 to 0.96, P ≤ .05). Variability (expressed as total error) for the static-dynamometer and roman-chair tests was 18.3 and 11.6 seconds, respectively, with 2.8 and 1.6 repetitions for the dynamic-dynamometer and roman-chair tests, respectively.

Conclusions:

Lumbar muscle endurance can be reliably assessed by both static and dynamic protocols on high- and low-technology devices.

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