ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT: This paper intended to examine the influence of cooling forearm/hand on grip MVC and the associated time needed to reach the MVC (denoted as TMVC). Twenty volunteers, including 10 males and 10 females, were recruited for this study. All were righthanded, healthy, and free of musculoskeletal disorders in the upper extremities. The apparatus and materials used included a water bath, a submersible cooler, a digital thermometer and hygrometer, a digital 4-channel thermometer, and a grip gauge with a load cell. The grip span of the grip gauge was set at 5 cm and the handles were wrapped in bandages to prevent slippage during exertion. Participants’ grip MVCs were measured before and after a cooling immersion, in which participants were asked to immerse their dominant hands into the 14ºC-water bath up to the elbow joint for 30 minutes. After 30-min cooling, the hand skin temperature was about 14.2°C for both genders. The ANOVA results indicated that lowering the skin temperature on forearm/hand could reduce hand grip MVC, but did not shift the TMVC. In summary, the influence of cooling the HST is just on the magnitude of grip force, but not on the time consumed to generate the grip MVC.
