There are a lot of medical tests that get left off of the typical physical exam. Testing the strength of your grip is one big example.
Why is grip strength important?
The muscles that operate your hand are only one muscle group among many in your body, but grip strength is an accurate gauge of your overall strength and muscle mass. Extra muscle mass is important to health – it gives you energy reserves to fight off illness, it prevents falls and fractures, and it’s metabolically important to counterbalance a tendency toward inflammation and tissue degeneration.
Grip strength can be easily tested with a dynamometer.
You give the handle a maximal squeeze and the device measures your strength. Your reading can be compared to age- and sex- based norms.
The conventional physical exam reveals only a small slice of your health outlook. Look deeper.
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