Our study is not the first to investigate an exercise that activates the serratus anterior above 90° of shoulder flexion.
Shoulder elevation in the plane of the scapula above 120° using a hand weight maximally activated the serratus anterior.
Likewise, serratus anterior activation was high during shoulder elevation exercises from 120° to 150° of shoulder flexion.
Our results complement these reports, as we found similar magnitudes of serratus anterior activation during the scapular plane shoulder elevation and wall slide exercises.
We hypothesize that a potential advantage of the wall slide exercise as described here is that it could be implemented earlier in the rehabilitation process than other shoulder abduction and elevation exercises studied previously because, anecdotally, patients report that it is less painful to perform.
Further studies are required to test this speculation.