Test-Retest Reliability of Lifting and Carrying in a 2-day Functional Capacity Evaluation

The objectives of this study were to establish test-retest reliability of lifting and carrying of a functional capacity evaluation (FCE) on two consecutive days and to verify the need for a 2-day protocol. A cohort of 50 patients (39 men, 11 women) with nonspecific low back pain were evaluated using a 2-day FCE protocol. Intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) were calculated for weight lifted and carried. Predictive relationschips between test and retest were explored by means of a regression analysis. The results of ICC were lift-ing low 0.87, lifting overhead 0.87, and carrying 0.77. Performances on day 2 were on an average 6–9 % higher. Other than the amount of weight handled on day 1, no vari-able was found to predict performance on day 2. It was concluded that test-retest relia-bility of lifting and carrying was good, and the need for a 2-day protocol could not be confirmed. KEY WORDS: low back pain; occupational rehabilitation; reliability; functional capacity evaluation