Reliability of the Joint Position Sense Error Test for Women With Neck Pain and Asymptomatic Men and Women

Abstract

ObjectiveThe purpose of this study was to evaluate the intra-rater between-days reliability of the joint position sense error (JPSE) test in asymptomatic men and women, as well as in women with neck pain. MethodsFourteen asymptomatic men and 27 women (14 asymptomatic and 13 with neck pain) participated. The JPSE test was performed during right and left cervical rotation (10 trials for each side) in 2 sessions, with at least 7 days between them. The head repositioning error during the JPSE test (in degrees) was measured and used to calculate the intra-rater between-days reliability of the test, evaluated through the intraclass correlation coefficient and Bland-Altman analyses. Independent t tests were calculated to compare the head repositioning errors of asymptomatic women and men. The minimal detectable change was also calculated. ResultsThe neck pain group showed higher intraclass correlation coefficient values (0.866 and 0.773, good reliability) compared to the asymptomatic men (0.478 and 0.403, poor reliability) and to the asymptomatic women (-0.161 and 0.504, poor and moderate reliability, respectively) for both right and left cervical rotation, respectively. Considering Bland-Altman analyses, the neck pain group showed better agreement between the measurements for right cervical rotation than the asymptomatic groups. ConclusionThe results indicate that the methodology used to perform the JPSE test in this study may be a reliable way to assess the proprioception of women with neck pain in clinical settings.