The Influence of Hand Muscle Fatigue and Fatigue Recovery on Joint Position Sense in Healthy Subjects

Purpose: The first purpose of this study was to evaluate whether hand muscle fatigue alters sensorimotor control of the hand in healthy subjects, using hand position sense. The second objective was to assess the repositioning variables during a 7.5-min period after the fatigue protocol. Methods: Participants performed a repeated handgrip movement to induce the fatigue condition as fast as possible, until they could no longer continue. Recordings were performed before (pre-fatigue) and after the completion of the fatigue exercises (immediately: post-fatigue, after a 2.5 min recovery, after a 5 min recovery and after a 7.5 min recovery). Results: The joint reposition test of the MP joint in the post-fatigue condition showed higher reposition errors than the prefatigue condition (p<0.05). Additionally, there was a significant difference in recovery of joint reposition errors after fatiguing exercises of the hand muscle, among groups (p<0.05). Conclusion: The fatigue of the hand muscles affected joint position sense by an alteration of somatosensory and proprioceptive information. Nonetheless, the effect of hand muscle fatigue was short-lived, since joint reposition errors decreased to post-fatigue values after 7.5 min of recovery.