Correlation among tools for the assessment of functional independence and physical activity levels in infants

Abstract

Assessment tools to quantify functional independence and physical activity levels are particularly useful for making decisions and monitoring rehabilitation programs. There are many tools available to assess independence in children. However, such tools can be more or less responsive to independence conditions. The aim of this study was to verify the correlation between functional independence parameters and physical activity levels quantified by different assessment tools in 4 and 5 year-old children. For this, 20 children whose motor development was appropriate for their age were assessed by the following tools: (1) Pediatric Evaluation Disability Inventory (PEDI), (2) Evaluation Questionnaire of Independence Level for Daily Life Activities in 4 to 8 year-old children (Questionnaire), and (3) Physical Activity Questionnaire for Children (PAQ-C). Delineation of a Cross-sectional study was utilized, with the measurements taken at just one moment describing the variables and their distribution and association patterns. For that age group, only for the self-care functional skills assessed by PEDI, significant correlation was observed with the age indicating higher independence values for the older children. For all other PEDI categories and for the other tools utilized in this study, that independence-age correlation was not significant. Despite the independence-age correlation having not been found in infants assessed by the Questionnaire, other significant correlations were observed between the Questionnaire values obtained and some PEDI values. No significant correlations were observed between the PAQ-C values obtained and the other tools. In conclusion, some categories quantified by PEDI are not correlated with functional independence changes detected by other categories by the same tool. Still, the correlation between Questionnaire values and PEDI values was observed in just some categories assessed by PEDI. Finally, PAQ-C did not correlate with the other two tools, suggesting the need for a better investigation into the responsiveness of the measurements from psychometric studies.