Kajsa Johansson and Sören Ivarson
The objective of the study was to assess intra- and interexaminer reliability for four manual shoulder maneuvers; the Neer impingement sign, the Hawkins–Kennedy impingement test, the Patte maneuver, the Jobe supraspinatus test. The four standardised manoeuvers were performed by a physiotherapist on 33 participants. After a week, the maneuvers were performed again by the same physical therapist (test–retest) and by another physical therapist (test for interexaminer reliability). The results shoed that all four maneuvers have an almost perfect agreement if performed with suggested standardizations.
Neer impingement sign, Hawkins–Kennedy impingement test, Patte maneuver as well as Jobe supraspinatus test, are highly reproducible and therefore reliable to use in clinical practice to identify patients with subacromial pain with an impingement phenomenon, but the maneuvers are limited as structural discriminators.
Manual Therapy,5 May 2008, online article ahead of press