The spinal cord injury spasticity evaluation tool: development and evaluation.
OBJECTIVE
To develop and assess the reliability and validity of a new scale designed to measure the impact of spasticity on daily life in people with spinal cord injury (SCI).


METHODS
Scale development and assessment.


METHODS
General community.


METHODS
Community-dwelling persons with chronic SCI and spasticity participated in study 1 (n=9), study 2 (n=19), and study 3 (n=61).


METHODS
Not applicable.


METHODS
Study 1: participant definitions of spasticity and list of scale items. Study 2: scale refinement, face validity, and time to complete. Study 3: internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and construct validity.


RESULTS
The Spinal Cord Injury Spasticity Evaluation Tool (SCI-SET) is a 7-day recall self-report questionnaire that takes into account both the problematic and useful effects of spasticity on daily life in people with SCI. The scale exhibited good face validity and required 6.8+/-2.6 minutes to complete. The internal consistency (alpha) and intraclass correlation coefficient of the SCI-SET were .90 and .91, respectively. Construct validity was supported by correlations (r range, -.48 to .68; P<.01) between SCI-SET scores and theoretically meaningful constructs.


CONCLUSIONS
The SCI-SET fills a need for a reliable and valid self-report measure of the impact of spasticity on daily life in people with SCI, taking into account both the problematic and useful effects of spasticity.
Adams
Melanie M
MM
Department of Kinesiology, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada.
Ginis
Kathleen A Martin
KA
Hicks
Audrey L
AL
D000328:Adult; D002574:Cervical Vertebrae; D004185:Disability Evaluation; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009128:Muscle Spasticity / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013119:Spinal Cord Injuries / Q000150:complications* / Q000534:rehabilitation; D013904:Thoracic Vertebrae; D015599:Trauma Severity Indices