Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 15, 2026
Screening People on Standing Balance with Romberg Testing and Walking Balance with Tandem Walking
Published on: September 1, 2023
The functional assessment Berg Balance Scale is better capable of estimating fall risk in the elderly than the
Vanessa Vieira Pereira1, Roberto Alcantara Maia, Sonia Maria Cesar de Azevedo Silva
1Instituto de Assistência Médica ao Servidor Público Estadual, São Paulo, Brazil. vanessazen@hotmail.com
Abstract:
The purpose of this study was to verify which instrument better identifies recurrent falls in the elderly. Ninety-eight old people, with an average age of 80 ± 4 years, were submitted to an assessment of balance and fall risk by means of the Berg Balance Scale (BBS) and the posturographic Balance Stability System (BSS). The BBS was correlated with the BSS (r=-0.27; p=0.008), age (r=-0.38; p<0.001) and number of falls (r=-0.25; p=0.013) and the analysis of logistical regression showed that the elderly classified with fall risk on the BBS presented 2.5 (95%CI 1.08-5.78) more chance of identifying who had two falls or more over the last year. The BBS identified that the greater the age the worse the functional balance and demonstrated a greater capacity to identify falls risk suffered over the last year when compared with the BSS.
