Authors: Marco Monticone Paola Baiardi Carla Vanti Silvano Ferrari Paolo Pillastrini Raffaele Mugnai Calogero Foti
Publish Date: 2011/08/08
Volume: 21, Issue: 1, Pages: 122-129
Abstract
An ability to assess longitudinal changes in health status is crucial for the outcome measures used in treatment efficacy trials The aim of this study was to verify the responsiveness of the Italian versions of the Oswestry Disability Index ODI and the Roland Morris Disability Questionnaire RMDQ in subjects with subacute or chronic low back pain LBPAt the beginning and end of an 8 week rehabilitation programme 179 patients completed a booklet containing the ODI the RMDQ a 0–10 numerical rating scale NRS and the 36item ShortForm Health Survey SF36 A global perception of change scale was also completed at the end of the programme and collapsed to produce a dichotomous outcome ie improved vs not improved Responsiveness was assessed by means of distribution methods minimum detectable change MDC effect size ES standardised response mean SRM and anchorbased methods ROC curvesThe MDC for the ODI and RMDQ was respectively 1367 and 487 the ES was 053 and 068 and the SRM was 080 and 081 ROC analysis revealed an area under the curve of 071 for the ODI and 064 for the RMDQ thus indicating discriminating capacity the best cutoff point for the dichotomous outcome was 95 for the ODI sensitivity 76 and specificity 63 and 25 for the RMDQ sensitivity 62 and specificity 55 These estimates were comparable between the subacute and chronic subjects Both the ODI and the RMDQ moderately correlated with the SF36 and NRS Spearman’s and Pearson’s correlation coefficients of 030The Italian ODI and RMDQ proved to be sensitive in detecting clinical changes after conservative treatment for subacute and chronic LBP Our findings are consistent with those published in the literature thus allowing crosscultural comparisons and stimulating crossnational studies
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