The Reliability of Lumbar Lordosis Measurements Using a Flexible-Rule.

The purpose of this study was to examine the intra-rater and intra-rater reliability of lumbar lordosis measurements taken with a flexible-rule. Two measurements were taken on 40 subjects without low back pain LBP and 40 subjects with LBP by two physical therapists. Intraclass correlation coefficients ICC were used to determine the degree of agreement between measurements. The results suggest that measurements of lumbar lordosis with a flexible-rule may be reliable if taken by the same physical therapist. However, the degree of reliability may vary from therapist to therapist. The inter-rater reliability of these measurements appears to be poor, but these results may be inconclusive due to the limited number of therapist participating in this study.