Active Trunk Rotation Test

How to Perform

The patient is in the standard supine position with arms resting on the stomach. The knees are dropped to the left to allow the examiner to place the palpating fingers of the left hand on the right side of the subject’s spine. The palpating fingers are in the spinal gutter medial to the erector spinae muscles. The examiner localizes the rotation to his/her palpating fingers and asks the patient to contract or press back into the fingers at each segmental level of the spine examining from approximately T12 to L5. This tests the ability of the subject to contract the multifidi on the right side of the spine which should contract to assist in rotating the spine back to the left.