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Abstract
Introduction
In general practice, dizziness is one of the most frequently reported complaints. Dizziness, as a part of other clinical syndromes, is found in 16% of patients and is frequently associated with whiplash-associated disorders (WAD). In manual/musculoskeletal medicine the Hautant procedure has been advocated as a test for disturbed neck proprioception. The main aim of the present study was to evaluate in a quantitative way the reproducibility of Hautant's procedure in normal subjects.
Patients and methods
Ten healthy subjects, all women, participated in the reproducibility study with a mean age of 23.3 (range 18–28, SD 3.3). Nine subjects, who were diagnosed with WAD grade II, were included with a mean age of 33 (range 17–42, SD 15.6) and contained four male and five female subjects. Arm motion patterns in combination with a particular head movement were registered with a 3 Space Inside Track HP. A neutral-positioned receiver was attached to the ceiling, which quantified arm motion in the frontal sagittal and transversal planes, y, z, and yaw values, respectively.
Results
Of the 42 absolute differences in the y, z, and yaw values, 40 were reproducible. No particular motion pattern in combination with a particular head movement was seen, either in normal subjects or WAD II patients.
Conclusions
Based on our results, the Hautant test, as we performed it, is reproducible. In the original paper, Hautant used his test as a vestibular one and made no relation at all with cervical propriocepsis. Since no differences were found between normal subjects and WAD II patients, in clinical practice the diagnostic value of the Hautant test is very low.