Abstract
Purpose
We aimed to measure the thickness and reliability of soft tissue surrounding the shoulder
joint and using ultrasonography in the elderly compared to young adults.
Subjects and Methods
11 each of the elderly and young adults were recruited in this study. The thickness of
supraspinatus tendon （SST）, subacromial bursa （SAB） and long head of the biceps tendon
（BT） were measured using ultrasound. Intra-rater reliability of ultrasound measurements
were evaluated by calculating the intraclass correlation coefficient （ICC）. Bland-Altman
method and standard error of measurement （SEM） was used to evaluate systematic bias of
repeated measurements. The statistic difference in the measurements of tissue thickness
between the elderly and young adults was analysed with two independent groups t-test.
Results and Discussion
ICCs for overall measurements were SST; 0.91, SAB; 0.82, BT; 0.90 in young adults and
SST; 0.94, SAB; 0.87, BT; 0.87 in the elderly, SEMs were small and there was no systematic
bias across all outcomes for repeated measurements. The measurements of both SST and BT
in the elderly showed significantly greater thickness than those in young adults.
