The Relationship between Strength and Muscle Tone with Upper Limb Function in Hemiplegic Children

The goal of this study was to investigate the relationship between strength and muscle tone with upper limb function in hemiplegic children. In this cross-sectional (descriptive-analytical) study thirty-seven 5-10 year-old hemiplegic children with cerebral palsy were selected through convenient sampling. They were selected from those attending the clinics affiliated with the ‘University of Social Welfare and Rehabilitation Sciences’ of Tehran. The participants’ hand function skills were evaluated by the ‘Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency’, the level of spasticity was evaluated by the Ashworth Scale and strength was evaluated by the Vigorimeter. All data were analyzed with SPSS 16. Data analysis showed significant associations between strength and dexterity (p=0.000), bilateral coordination (p=0.024), upper motor coordination (p=0.000) and visual-motor coordination (p=0.045), and between wrist muscle tone and dexterity (p=0.01), bilateral coordination (p=0.035), upper limb coordination (p=0.013) and visual-motor coordination (p=0.032), as well as between elbow muscle tone and dexterity (p=0.004), and visual-motor coordination (p=0.017). However, there was no signification association between the shoulder muscle tone and upper motor function (p≤0.05). There was a positive relationship between muscle strength and upper motor function of hemiplegic children. And there was a negative relationship between wrist spasticity and upper motor function.