Correlative study between handgrasp power with handwriting speed and legibility among medical students

Abstract

Background: Medical students must possess four skills namely reading, writing, speaking and listening as potential doctors. Writing as a skill is particularly important as it helps them to perform well academically as well asprevent drawbacks of bad handwriting later like illegible prescriptions. The deterioration of handwriting starts in medical school due to time bound subjective assessment pattern in medical schools.
Objectives:To assess if there was any association between grasp powerwith handwriting speed and legibility. This will help therapists deal with writing issues by improving handgrip strength which is a function of intrinsic muscles of hand.Material and methods:Grasp power (in Kgs) , handwriting speed (Letters per minute) and handwriting legibility score(1-4) were measured for 100(M=30,F=70) undergraduate medical students. Descriptive statistics was used to expressed quantitative variable as mean±S.D. Independent t test was used to compare mean grasp power left and right hand between male and female. Pearson correlation coefficient was used to find correlation between grasp power with letters per minute and legibility score. Results and conclusions:Mean Grasp power of right hand for female subjects was found to be 13.5±6.3 kgs while for males it was 33.23± 12.6 kgs.Grasp power on right and left side showed a statistically significant difference between the two genders.Handwriting speed for females was 117±9.25 letters per minute as compared to 124.13±14.46 letters per minute for males.. It was observed there is positive correlation between RGP(Right hand Grip power) and HWS(Letters per minute) ( r=0.24) . There was no correlation between grasp power and handwriting legibility.The present study establishes a positive corelation between grasp power and handwriting speed. This will help in addressing calligraphic issues amongst medical students.