Errors in Shoulder Joint Position Sense Mainly Come from the Glenohumeral Joint

Abstract

While synchronous movement of glenohumeral and scapulothoracic joints has been emphasized in previous kinematics studies, most investigations of shoulder joint position sense have treated the shoulder complex as a single joint. The purposes of this study were to investigate the joint position sense errors of the humerothoracic, glenohumeral and scapulothoracic joints at different elevation angles and to examine whether the errors of the glenohumeral and scapulothoracic joints contribute to the errors of the humerothoracic joint. Fifty-one subjects with healthy shoulders were recruited. Active joint position sense of the humerothoracic, glenohumeral and scapulothoracic joints was measured at 50°, 70° and 90° of humerothoracic elevation in the scapular plane. The results showed that while scapulothoracic joint position sense errors were not affected by target angles, there was an angle effect on humerothoracic and glenohumeral errors, with errors decreasing as the target angles approached 90° of elevation. The results of a multiple regression analysis revealed that glenohumeral errors explained most of the variance of the humerothoracic errors and that scapulothoracic errors had a weaker predictive relationship with humerothoracic errors. Therefore, it may be necessary to test scapular joint position sense separately in addition to the assessment of the overall shoulder joint position sense.

Hypermobility in Adolescent Athletes: Pain, Functional Ability, Quality of Life, and Musculoskeletal Injuries

“…28 Poor balance, measured as increased sway, has been identified in adults with GJH, 31 and a recent study found increased sway to be a predictor of injuries in a general population of children aged 9 to 15 years. 27 However, adult elite-level dancers have shown superior balance ability compared to the general population, possibly because the elite-level training leads to a protective effect against falling, even in dancers with GJH.…”

A comparative study of shoulder muscle strength, sense of proprioception and internal/external rotation flexibility between adolescent athletes with and without scapular asymmetry

“…It is thought that participation of the athletes without a shoulder injury, a stronger association of scapular asymmetry with scapular asymmetry scapulothoracic joint than the glenohumeral joint might be the reason for this result. It is suggested that the sense of proprioception of the scapulothoracic joint should be evaluated as the sense of proprioception of the glenohumeral joint, in the presence of the scapular asymmetry [26].…”

Évaluation des variations proprioceptives de la ceinture scapulaire chez le sujet sain. À propos de 44 cas

“…Les muscles seraient alors simplement les effecteurs de la proprioception et non du mouvement. Cependant, il semble que ce recours ne soit pas suffisant car la proprioception est moins efficace lors de la mobilisation passive plutôt qu'active, les muscles en étant effecteurs lorsqu'ils sont contractés (11,20).…”

“…Actuellement, les tests développés s'attachent à évaluer la SPA et nécessitent souvent une instrumentation spécifique, souvent coûteuse et parfois difficile à mettre en oeuvre (9,10). Tester la SPA en mobilité active en donne un reflet plus précis de par la contraction musculaire produisant des signaux afférents, participant à la stabilité et présente dans les gestes de la vie quotidienne (11). En utilisant cette méthode de mesure, l'objectif primaire de cette étude était d'isoler les facteurs pouvant influencer l'évaluation de la SPA au niveau de la ceinture scapulaire chez des sujets sains.…”