The Pregnancy Mobility Index: a mobility scale during and after pregnancy.
BACKGROUND
During pregnancy, every second woman will experience some degree of back or pelvic pain. While several validated instruments to assess back pain exist for the general population, these are not suitable for application in a pregnant population and have not been validated for this purpose. A pregnant population not only differs from the general population regarding the type of back pain--frequently a pelvic girdle component is added--but pregnant women also have different mobility patterns and expectations. We therefore present in this study a self-report mobility scale specifically designed for a pregnant population: the Pregnancy Mobility Index.


METHODS
Longitudinal cohort study including 672 nulliparous women with a singleton low-risk pregnancy. The Pregnancy Mobility Index consists of items concerning day-to-day activities selected through literature research and clinical experience. Participating women completed the questionnaire at 12 and 36 weeks' gestation and one year after delivery. Reliability, construct and criterion validity were tested.


RESULTS
The internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) was 0.8 or higher. The Pregnancy Mobility Index scales correlated best with the physical and pain scale of the RAND-36, indicating a good construct validity. The assumptions that the Pregnancy Mobility Index scores increase during pregnancy and decrease after delivery and that women with back or pelvic problems scored higher on the Pregnancy Mobility Index domains than women without back or pelvic pain were confirmed, indicating a good criterion validation.


CONCLUSIONS
The Pregnancy Mobility Index has been shown to be a reliable and valid questionnaire well suited for use during and after pregnancy.
van de Pol
G
G
Department of Perinatology and Gynecology, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands. geertev@hotmail.com
de Leeuw
J R J
JR
van Brummen
H J
HJ
Bruinse
H W
HW
Heintz
A P M
AP
van der Vaart
C H
CH
D000203:Activities of Daily Living; D001416:Back Pain / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D015331:Cohort Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008137:Longitudinal Studies; D009426:Netherlands / Q000453:epidemiology; D010147:Pain Measurement; D017699:Pelvic Pain / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011247:Pregnancy; D011248:Pregnancy Complications / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires