Related Experiment Video
Updated: Mar 18, 2026
Experimental Strategies to Bridge Large Tissue Gaps in the Injured Spinal Cord after Acute and Chronic Lesion
Published on: April 5, 2016
The reliability of measuring wound undermining in people with spinal cord injury
M Arora1,2, L A Harvey1,2, H S Chhabra3
1John Walsh Centre for Rehabilitation Research, Kolling Institute of Medical Research, St Leonards, NSW, Australia.
Objective:
The objective of this study was to determine the reliability of measuring wound undermining in people with spinal cord injury (SCI).
Study Design:
A psychometric study.
Setting:
The study was conducted at the Indian Spinal Injuries Centre, New Delhi, India.
Participants:
Thirty people with a complete or incomplete SCI and a pressure ulcer with wound undermining were recruited.
Methods:
Wound undermining was measured using the four cardinal points from a clock face (with 12 O'clock defined as towards the head). Inter-rater reliability was tested by comparing the wound undermining scores from two different assessors. Intra-rater reliability was tested by comparing the wound undermining scores from the same assessor on two different days.
Results:
The intraclass correlation coefficients (95% confidence interval) for inter-rater and intra-rater reliability were 0.996 (0.992-0.999) and 0.998 (0.996-0.999), respectively. Repeat measurements by the same and different assessor were within 0.3 cm of each other, 80% and 83% of the time, respectively.
Conclusion:
Measurements of wound undermining have excellent reliability.
