Table 7. Levels of evidence^a of lower limb strength measurements based on Brink and Louw^b methodological quality.

Neurological test or method	Diagnosis	Measurement property
		Intra-rater reliability	Inter-rater reliability	Validity	Responsiveness
ASIA Impairment Scale	SCI	± Conflicting [57]	No evidence	No evidence	No evidence
CMTPedS	CMT	No evidence	++ Moderate [45]	No evidence	No evidence
HHD	CP	± Conflictingc [46, 47, 51, 52, 54]	± Conflicting [53]	No evidence	No evidence
	SB	+ Limited [48]	++ Moderate [49]	No evidence	No evidence
	DMD	++ Moderate [50]	No evidence	No evidence	No evidence
MMT	SB	No evidence	± Conflicting [49]	No evidence	No evidence
	DMD	± Conflicting [55,56]	? Unknown [55]	No evidence	No evidence
RQMS	CP	No evidence	? Unknown [55]	No evidence	No evidence
SHR	CP	++ Moderate [52]	No evidence	No evidence	No evidence

CMTPedS, Charcot- Marie- Tooth Paediatric Scale; HHD, Hand held dynamometer; MMT, Manual muscle test; RQMS, Richmond Quantitative Measurement System; SHR, Standing heel rise; +++ or— = strong evidence with consistent findings from two or more good quality papers or one paper of excellent quality; ++ or— = moderate evidence with consistent findings from two or more fair quality papers or one paper of good quality; + or— = limited evidence with consistent findings from one paper of fair quality, ± = conflicting evidence with inconsistent findings from one or more papers of fair quality,? = unknown evidence with findings only from papers of poor quality, 0 = no evidence.

^aAdapted from Terwee et al., [7] Dobson et al. [31] and Dekkers et al. [20]

^bMethodological quality based on Brink and Louw et al.’s [6] critical appraisal tool using an arbitrary grades based on the percentage of “yes” responses for applicable items. Arbitrary grades: <40% = Poor, 40%-59% = Fair, 60% - 79% = Good, >80% = Excellent.

^cBoth Taylor et al. [51] and Van Vulpen et al. [52] report “test-retest reliability”, however their measurement characteristics (S4 Table) fit the definition of intra-rater reliability defined as defined in Table 1.