A Prospective Evaluation of Grip Strength Comparing a Low-Tech Method to Dynanometry in Preoperative Surgical Patients and Weak Intensive Care Patients

Objective. Grip strength testing offers a mechanism to identify patients in whom frailty might be present, discriminate between robust elderly and vulnerable younger patients, and can be used as a tool to track changes in muscle bulk over the course of an inpatient stay. We compared gold-standard quantitative grip strength measurement to a low-tech alternative, a manual bedside sphygmomanometer. Design. Under supervision, subjects performed hand-grip strength testing with each instrument. A mean score is calculated from three measurements on the dominant and nondominant hand. Setting. Testing was performed in a tertiary centre in Perth, Western Australia, in both outpatient clinics and intensive care units. Participants. 51 adult pre-operative surgical outpatients were assessed, alongside 20 intensive care inpatients identified as being weak. Main outcome measures. A statistical correlation between the two measures was evaluated. Feasibility, safety, and convenience were also assessed in outpatient and bedside settings. Results. Highly correlated results in both tertiary surgical outpatients (r(s) = 0.895, p