title: Hypermobility among school children aged five to eight years: the Hospital del Mar Criteria gives higher prevalence for hypermobility than the Beighton score.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  The purpose was to investigate the distribution of hypermobility among school children aged five to eight years.
  
  
  METHODS
  One hundred and twenty-eight participants were assessed using the Beighton score and the Hospital del Mar criteria.
  
  
  RESULTS
  With the Beighton score using the cut-off ≥4, the prevalence was 12%, and with the Hospital del Mar criteria the prevalence was 34%. There were significantly higher scores for females on both the Beighton (p=0.01) and Hospital del Mar criteria (p<0.0001). The youngest children aged five to six years scored higher compared with the seven- and eight-year-olds (p=0.016). The knee flexion was most likely to be hypermobile (97%), followed by shoulder rotation (80%), thumb (31%), elbow (27%), metatarsal-phalangeal (16%), hip (15.5%), fingers (10%) or knee (10%), ankle (6%), trunk (4%) and patella (2%).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Gender and probably age must be taken into account when children are assessed for hypermobility. The Hospital del Mar criteria need to be modified for some of the motions.
authors.affiliation: Department of Paediatrics, University of Gothenburg, Queen Silvia Children's Hospital, Gothenburg, Sweden. anna.ohman@vgregion.se.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Öhman
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Westblom
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Henriksson
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D053587:Arthrometry, Articular / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006776:Hospitals, Pediatric / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D007593:Joint Instability / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D007596:Joints / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008297:Male; D015995:Prevalence; D012107:Research Design; D012307:Risk Factors; D012737:Sex Factors; D013548:Sweden / Q000453:epidemiology