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Shoulder Special Test: Drop Arm Test
The Drop Arm Test is a special test used to assess shoulder integrity and muscular strength. This test is performed with the patient standing and the arm fully extended to their side. The patient then has to lower the arm while keeping the elbow fully extended and the thumb pointing up. The test will assess the patient's ability to control the arm as it is lowered to their side under gravity. Abnormal results may include difficulty lowering the arm or pain during the test.
Transcript
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This is Brent of the Brookbush
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...blank
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Institute, and in this video we're going over
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a special, or orthopedic test for the
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shoulder. This is known as the Drop Arm
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Test and is indicative of supraspinatus
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tear and/or impingement syndrome.
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I'm going to have my friend, Melissa, come
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out. She's going to help me demonstrate.
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Now, our subjective evaluation would have
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led us to believe that, maybe, Melissa has
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done something to damage her rotator
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cuff. So, I'm going to have her go ahead and
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face me. You're going to stand in front
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of your patient. You're going to help
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them to 90 degrees of abduction. Good. Can
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you hold that right there? Nowm what I
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want you to do is slowly let both of
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your arms down to your sides. Okay.
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We're going to go ahead and turn around
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and show this to you. You're supposed
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to be in front of your patient. I'm going to
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have to turn behind Melissa here. So, I'm
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going to passively take her into
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abduction and ask her, "Can you hold this?" Okay,
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if they can't hold that, that's a good
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indication that you have a positive Drop
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Arm Test already. Okay, now slowly lower
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your arms down. And what you'll notice,
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guys, in the Drop Arm Test is one arm-
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they're not able to slowly decelerate
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adduction. That's an indication that
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they're supraspinatus can't do its
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job and/or it's painful. As I mentioned
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before, this could be an indicator of
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impingement, although I don't see it used
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as often for that particular diagnosis.
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This test does happen to be very
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specific but not particularly sensitive.
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My guess is is that when you see this, it
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is most likely supraspinatus issues, but
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because your deltoid is such a
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strong abductor, it's also very possible
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that you have supraspinatus issues
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and still pass the Drop Arm Test. That is,
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you get a negative result on the Drop
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Arm Test, because your deltoid is able to
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compensate. So, let me go over this one
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more time, guys. Passively, you're
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going to bring them up to 90 degrees. Now
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what you need to do is be able to see
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from the front
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here, whether they can slowly and
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smoothly allow both arms to equally come
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back down to adduction. If it's not
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equal and it doesn't look smooth, that is a
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positive Drop Arm Test. Now, of course, I'm
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going to use this in a cluster of exams.
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I'm not going to rely on this test by
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itself. I'm going to go ahead and do my
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impingement exams. I'm going to do
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other rotator cuff exams. I'm going to
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use that subjective exam. I'll gather all
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of that data together to start creating
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a hypothesis, and then I'm going to use
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that hypothesis to start
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selecting interventions. Now, if this is
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the positive test and is
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what we are trying to improve, then this is
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the test I'm going to keep coming back
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to in my quick tests so that I can tell
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whether my intervention is being
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successful, and don't think that all
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of your interventions are going to be
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successful. Even if there's no
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improvement between the first time I did
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the drop arm test, the interventions I
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just did, and the second time I did the
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Drop Arm Test, that's just that many more
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interventions I'm not going to use and
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I've narrowed down my focus. I hope you
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guys enjoyed this video. I hope you add
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one more assessment to your bag of
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assessments, because as you guys
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improve as professionals, I can promise
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you one thing. It's not the hundreds of
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interventions and hundreds of techniques that you will learn that are
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going to make you a marquee practitioner,
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it is the large amount of assessments
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and your ability to create an accurate
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hypothesis that is going to make you
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rise to the top as a practitioner. Step
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up your assessment game. I look forward
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to seeing you guys soon.
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