Intra- and Inter-evaluator Reproducibility of Upper Limb Strength Measures in Patients With COPD

According to the recommendations of French and international learned societies, respiratory rehabilitation is part of the care of patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). Indeed, scientific work carried out for more than 10 years on the respiratory rehabilitation of patients suffering from COPD shows that respiratory rehabilitation allows a reduction of the handicap caused by the disease and an improvement in the quality of life of the patients. A respiratory rehabilitation program (PRR) includes: individual exercise re-training, therapeutic education, respiratory physiotherapy, help with smoking cessation and nutritional and psychosocial care. Exercise retraining includes training the muscles of the lower limbs in endurance and strength combined with training the muscles of the upper limbs. Strengthening the upper limbs helps reduce dyspnea in patients with COPD. In order to determine a precise muscle building protocol, it is necessary to assess at the start of the program the maximum voluntary strength (FMV) of the different muscle groups of the upper limbs. Measuring FMV quantifies a possible frequent strength deficit in patients with COPD and the effects of the strengthening program. Currently, tests to assess FMV using isokinetic dynamometers are used as a benchmark. However, this material is little used in current practice. Portable dynamometers are used to perform simple tests and to obtain muscle strength measurements. However, the reliability of the maximum voluntary force measurements of the different muscle groups of the upper limb has not been evaluated. Studies seem necessary to determine the reproducibility of the measurement in intra and inter-examiner (Schrama 2014) and to assess its sensitivity to change during a respiratory rehabilitation program. The objectives of this study are to study the reproducibility, validity and sensitivity to change of the measurement of FMV using a portable dynamometer.