Reliability and validity of Five Times Sit to Stand Test in pregnancy-related pelvic girdle pain

Abstract

BackgroundPelvic girdle pain (PGP) is a common musculoskeletal disorder during pregnancy, and functional mobility evaluation is very important in reflecting the treatment effects. ObjectivesTo investigate reliability and validity of Five Times Sit-to-Stand (5TSS) test in pregnant women with and without PGP. DesignA cross-sectional observational study. MethodsOne hundred sixty-seven women in the second or third trimester of pregnancy participated in two assessments one week apart. The 5TSS and Timed Up & Go (TUG) tests were used to assess functional mobility, in a randomized sequence, by two independent raters. Time to complete the tests were recorded. Perceived pain and difficulty during functional mobility tests were marked on two Visual Analogue Scales. Following tests of functional mobility, seven clinical tests were used to classify the subjects as with or without PGP. ResultsThe 25% of subjects had PGP. Inter-rater reliability of 5TSS was excellent for subjects with and without PGP (ICC = 0.999, 95% CI = 0.999–1.000; ICC = 0.999, 95% CI = 0.999–0.999, respectively). Test-retest reliability of 5TSS was also very high for subjects with and without PGP (ICC = 0.986, 95% CI = 0.959–0.995; ICC = 0.828, 95% CI = 0.632–0.920, respectively). The 5TSS scores were positively correlated with TUG scores (r = 0.420, p = 0.006 and r = 0.404, p = 0.000, respectively). The subjects reported higher pain (95% CI = 0.322–0.824) and difficulty (95%Cl = 0.500–1.042) during 5TSS than the TUG test. ConclusionsThe 5TSS test is a reliable and valid functional mobility outcome measure in pregnant women with and without PGP. Further psychometric properties of the measure such as responsiveness, should be investigated in the future.