Reliability of Volumetry and Perimetry to Assess Knee Volume.

ABSTRACT

CONTEXT The treatment of edema after a knee injury is usually 1 of the main objectives during rehabilitation. To assess the success of treatment, 2 methods are commonly used in clinical practice volumetry and perimetry. OBJECTIVE: To investigate the intra- and interassessor reliability of volumetry and perimetry to assess knee volume. DESIGN: Cross-sectional. SETTING: Laboratory. PARTICIPANTS: 45 healthy participants (26 women) with mean age of 22.4 ± 2.8 y. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Knee volume was assessed by 3 assessors (A, B, and C) with 3 methods (lower-limb volumetry [LLV], knee volumetry [KV], and knee perimetry [KP]). Assessor A was the most-experienced assessor, and assessor C, the least experienced. LLV and KV were performed with participants in the orthostatic position, while KP was performed with participants in supine. RESULTS: For the interassessor analysis, the ICC2,1 was high (.82) for KV and very high for LLV (.99) and KP (.99). For the intra-assessor analysis, ICC2,1 ranged from moderate to high for KV (.69-.83) and was very high for LLV (.99) and KP (.97-.99). CONCLUSION: KV, LLV, and KP are reliable methods, both intra- and interassessor, to measure knee volume.