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The Functional Mobility Scale (FMS)
H Kerr Graham1, Adrienne Harvey, Jillian Rodda
1Department of Orthopaedics, Royal Children's Hospital, Victoria, Australia. kerr.graham@rch.org.au
Insights
A new Functional Mobility Scale (FMS) effectively measures mobility in children with cerebral palsy across home, school, and community settings. This valid and reliable scale aids communication and tracks changes after interventions.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Orthopedics
- Rehabilitation Medicine
- Biomedical Engineering
Background:
- Cerebral palsy (CP) significantly impacts functional mobility in children.
- Existing mobility scales lack comprehensive assessment across diverse environments.
- Improved communication tools are needed for healthcare professionals managing pediatric CP.
Purpose of the Study:
- To introduce and validate a new Functional Mobility Scale (FMS) for children with cerebral palsy.
- To enhance communication regarding functional mobility among orthopaedic surgeons and health professionals.
- To provide a tool sensitive to changes in mobility following interventions.
Main Methods:
- Development of the Functional Mobility Scale (FMS) with scoring over three distinct distances.
- Validation of the FMS in a cohort of 310 children with cerebral palsy.
- Comparison of FMS scores with existing scales and instrumented measures of physical function.
Main Results:
- The FMS demonstrated strong construct, content, and concurrent validity.
- The scale proved reliable in a large, consecutive sample of children with CP.
- FMS effectively discriminated between children with varying levels of disability and mobility.
Conclusions:
- The Functional Mobility Scale (FMS) is a valid and reliable tool for assessing functional mobility in children with cerebral palsy.
- The FMS facilitates communication and aids in monitoring treatment outcomes.
- This scale is sensitive to changes in functional mobility, particularly after operative interventions.
Abstract:
We devised a new Functional Mobility Scale (FMS) to describe functional mobility in children with cerebral palsy, as an aid to communication between orthopaedic surgeons and health professionals. The unique feature of the FMS is the freedom to score functional mobility over three distinct distances, chosen to represent mobility in the home, at school and in the wider community. We examined the construct, content, and concurrent validity of the FMS in a cohort of 310 children with cerebral palsy by comparing the FMS to existing scales and to instrumented measures of physical function. We demonstrated the scale to be both valid and reliable in a consecutive population sample of 310 children with cerebral palsy seen in our tertiary referral center. The FMS was useful for discriminating between large groups of children with varying levels of disabilities and functional mobility and sensitive to detect change after operative intervention.
