Interinstrument Reliability Between the Squegg® Smart Dynamometer and Hand Grip Trainer and the Jamar® Hydraulic Hand Dynamometer: A Pilot Study.

IMPORTANCE: Occupational therapists need dependable and accurate instruments for remote assessments and monitoring of hand functionality. These assessments monitor progress, evaluate interventions, and guide independence goals. OBJECTIVE: To assess the interinstrument reliability and concurrent validity of the Squegg® Smart Dynamometer and Hand Grip Trainer and the Jamar® Hydraulic Hand Dynamometer. DESIGN: Repeated-measures design. SETTING: Individual clinic in Bucharest, Romania. PARTICIPANTS: Forty middle-age and older adult volunteers, healthy and free from any neuromuscular, orthopedic dysfunction that affected hand strength. OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Participants' maximal grip strength (MGS) for both their dominant and nondominant hands was measured with both devices. Participants with odd-numbered IDs were measured with the Squegg first and the Jamar second, and those with even-numbered IDs were measured in opposite sequence. RESULTS: Paired-samples t tests on overall mean MGS and mean MGS (three measures on each hand) showed no statistically significant differences between the two devices. Intraclass correlation analysis showed good to excellent interinstrument agreement. Pearson correlations between measurements across all participants, and hands, indicated strong agreement. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: The Squegg shows promise for health care professionals, including occupational therapists, for grip strength assessment in clinical contexts. What This Article Adds: These results offer initial psychometric data for a new remote MGS measurement device. MGS is crucial for assessing the physical function of aging adults. Reliable measurements from such a device are vital for occupational therapists to guide treatment interventions and assess hand function's impact on daily activities.

Validation of Alogo Move Pro: A GPS-Based Inertial Measurement Unit for the Objective Examination of Gait and Jumping in Horses.

Quantitative information on how well a horse clears a jump has great potential to support the rider in improving the horse's jumping performance. This study investigated the validation of a GPS-based inertial measurement unit, namely Alogo Move Pro, compared with a traditional optical motion capture system. Accuracy and precision of the three jumping characteristics of maximum height (Zmax), stride/jump length (lhorz), and mean horizontal speed (vhorz) were compared. Eleven horse-rider pairs repeated two identical jumps (an upright and an oxer fence) several times (n = 6 to 10) at different heights in a 20 × 60 m tent arena. The ground was a fiber sand surface. The 24 OMC (Oqus 7+, Qualisys) cameras were rigged on aluminum rails suspended 3 m above the ground. The Alogo sensor was placed in a pocket on the protective plate of the saddle girth. Reflective markers placed on and around the Alogo sensor were used to define a rigid body for kinematic analysis. The Alogo sensor data were collected and processed using the Alogo proprietary software; stride-matched OMC data were collected using Qualisys Track Manager and post-processed in Python. Residual analysis and Bland-Altman plots were performed in Python. The Alogo sensor provided measures with relative accuracy in the range of 10.5-20.7% for stride segments and 5.5-29.2% for jump segments. Regarding relative precision, we obtained values in the range of 6.3-14.5% for stride segments and 2.8-18.2% for jump segments. These accuracy differences were deemed good under field study conditions where GPS signal strength might have been suboptimal.