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14th Triennial Congress of the International Federation of Societies for Surgery of the Hand (IFSSH), 11th Triennial Congress of the International Federation of Societies for Hand Therapy (IFSHT)

17.06. - 21.06.2019, Berlin

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Validity of the “scratch collapse test” for the diagnosis of the carpal tunnel syndrome

Meeting Abstract

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  • presenting/speaker Belén García-Medrano - Hand and Microsurgery, HM Montepríncipe, Madrid, Spain
  • Clarisa Simón Pérez - Hospital Clínico, Valladolid, Spain
  • Montserrat Ocampos Hernández - Hospital Infanta Leonor, Madrid, Spain
  • Miguel Ángel Corella Montoya - Data Scientist, Geoblink, Madrid, Spain
  • Miguel Ángel Martín-Ferrero - Hospital Clínico, Valladolid, Spain
  • Pedro J. Delgado Serrano - Hand and Microsurgery, HM Montepríncipe, Madrid, Spain
  • Fernando Corella Montoya - Hospital Infanta Leonor, Quirón Hospital, Madrid, Spain

International Federation of Societies for Surgery of the Hand. International Federation of Societies for Hand Therapy. 14th Triennial Congress of the International Federation of Societies for Surgery of the Hand (IFSSH), 11th Triennial Congress of the International Federation of Societies for Hand Therapy (IFSHT), 11th Triennial Congress of the International Federation of Societies for Hand Therapy (IFSHT). Berlin, 17.-21.06.2019. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2020. DocIFSSH19-1477

doi: 10.3205/19ifssh0548, urn:nbn:de:0183-19ifssh05483

Published: February 6, 2020

© 2020 García-Medrano et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. See license information at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

Outline

Text

Objectives/Interrogation: Analyze the Scratch Collapse Test in an objective way, by replacing the subjective evaluation made by the physician with an objective evaluation measure, made with a digital dynamometer.

Methods: An observational study was carried out, in 90 patients divided into three groups. The first two groups were patients clinically and electromyographically diagnosed of carpal tunnel syndrome CTS (moderate and severe) and the third group, without CTS. The main variable to analyze is the external rotation strength. It was measured with a dynamometer. The purposes are: firstly describe if there were differences in the strength between the three attempts per patient of each group, and secondly analyzed if there were differences in the strength in the four different situations (no scratch test, scratch test in the carpal tunnel, dorsum of the wrist and shoulder).

Results and Conclusions: There were no discrepancy in the result of the scratch-collapse test in patients with moderate carpal tunnel. That existed in the result of the test in patients with severe carpal tunnel. But this statistical difference is only 0,08 kg, in the mean and this such a small difference is clinically undetectable; and in any case, it would be able to collapse the strength of external rotation.

Scratch Collapse Test is not a valid diagnostic exam if the strength is measure directly by the physician. A complete collapse of external rotation has not occur in any of the groups and a small loss of strength has been detected only in those patients with the highest grade of severity in carpal tunnel syndrome. If a physician wants to use this test for carpal tunnel, our advice is to measure the strength with a dynamometer.