The Patient-Rated Elbow Evaluation and the American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons—Elbow form capture aspects of functioning that are important to patients with elbow injuries

Abstract

Study DesignThis is a cross-sectional study. IntroductionThe Patient-Rated Elbow Evaluation (PREE) and the self-report section of the American Shoulder Elbow Surgeons–elbow form (pASES-e) are two important elbow-specific self-report measures used in routine clinical practice. Purpose of the StudyTo use the International Classification of Functioning Disability and Health (ICF) to link aspects of functioning that are reported using the Patient-Specific Functional Scale by a cohort of patients with elbow disorders and compare it to the content of the PREE and the pASES-e. MethodsOne hundred patients with a variety of elbow disorders (mean age and SD 53.88 (14.51); M: F 48: 52) were recruited from the Roth-McFarlane Hand and Upper Limb Centre. They self-reported important aspects of functioning using the Patient-Specific Functional Scale. These concerns were linked to the ICF using formal linking procedures. These ICF categories were compared to the categories related to the PREE and the pASES-e. Linking was carried out by two independent raters, and agreement was calculated using percentage agreement. ResultsA total of 423 self-reported functional activities were linked to 25 second-level ICF categories from the activity and participation domain. Commonly reported activities were D640 doing housework (52%); D540 dressing (47%); and D475 driving (35%). PREE had better coverage of the patient concerns (71%) than pASES-e (50%). D475–driving (35%) and D440–fine hand use (24%) were the 2 major categories that were not captured by the questionnaires. Agreement between the raters was 90.5%. DiscussionThis study established that the PREE and the pASES-e were able to capture aspects of functioning important to patients and that align with the ICF, with this happening to a greater extent on the PREE than the pASES-e. Because all patients reported concerns from the activity and participation section (‘d’ categories) of the ICF, this validated that these PROMs measure this conceptual domain. ConclusionThe PREE provided more comprehensive coverage of patients' functional concerns than the pASES-e.