Reliability of Goniometric Measurements of Children With Cerebral Palsy

Abstract

measurements from patients with hypertonicity (Ashton et a1 1978, Harris et al. d 6 et al. (1981), measuring children with s cerebral palsy, reported test-retest co-e effients ranging from r = 0.71 to r = 0.99. 2The six movements they recorded were 2 from the shoulder, elbow, hip and ankle. An additional 18 movements were not 'D used, since presumably the coefficients were below r = 0.71. However, the .c % authors did not report the procedures used, nor whether the measurements were made by one rater, or more than one. Rosenbaum et al. (1981) measured E shoulder and elbow movements, using -3 stop-action on a videotape monitor. 3 Agreement between the two raters s" 1985). Four previous studies have described selected goniometric measurements of children with hypertonicity. Sommerfeld 00 W 2 -c 0 u -2 averaged 80 per cent (range 75 to 83 per cent). A study of measurements from a 65 7 8 co Reliability of Goniometric Measurements Wayne A . Stuberg, Robert H. Fuchs, James A . Miedaner

Measures of muscle and joint performance in the lower limb of children with cerebral palsy

“…Our results for PROM are similar (Stuberg et al 1988) and somewhat less (McDowell et al 2000) than that previously reported in the literature. One explanation for this discrepancy could stem from the fact that in our study only 12 of 18 participants were measured by different raters on different days.…”

“…While reports are available on the reliability of PROM for children with CP, these are limited by small participant numbers (Ashton et al 1978, Harris et al 1985 or by the use of questionable statistical methods (Sommerfield et al 1981, Stuberg et al 1988). More recently, there have been reports on the reliability of lower-limb goniometric measurements for ambulatory children with CP (McDowell et al 2000, Thompson et al 2001.…”

The use of tiagabine in pediatric spasticity management

“…As errors of ±10 to 15˚ have been reported in measurements of motions in children with CP (Harris et al 1985, Stuberg et al 1998) only motions with a change of >15˚ were considered improved. The number of motions that were limited pretreatment and the number of motions that improved posttreatment were determined for each participant and the entire sample.…”

Reproducibility of an instrumented measure for passive ankle dorsiflexion in conscious and anaesthetized children with cerebral palsy

“…In children with CP, the range of interrater SEM for PADKE using goniometry is 6.5-7.8°. [8][9][10] Variations of up to 10°1 1,12 with 57% reported agreement measures within 5°1 2 were found in additional interrater studies investigating PADKE in children with CP. Factors thought to contribute to random error include changes in participant status and measurement error.…”

“…Measurement techniques for determining PADKE as a proxy for gastrocnemius musculotendinous unit length vary from simple goniometry 8,9,11,12,18 to more complex devices [14][15][16][17] and three-dimensional gait analysis. 22 Limitations include inherent variability (within participants, among assessors, and measurement error) and -as with three-dimensional gait analysis assessment -availability, time, and cost.…”