Information transfer: what do decision makers want and need from researchers?

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to undertake a systematic assessment of the need for research-based information by decision-makers working in community-based organizations. It is part of a more comprehensive knowledge transfer and exchange strategy that seeks to understand both the content required and the format/methods by which such information should be presented.

Methods: This was a cross-sectional telephone survey.

The Gross Motor Performance Measure: validity and responsiveness of a measure of quality of movement.

Background And Purpose: This article presents the results of a study to validate a measure of gross motor performance for its capacity to detect changes in the quality of movement in children with cerebral palsy aged 0 to 12 years.

Subjects And Methods: On two occasions, 4 to 6 months apart, physical therapists from three children's treatment centers assessed 106 children with cerebral palsy, 18 children who had sustained an acute head injury, and 29 nondisabled children. Validity was demonstrated by comparing changes on the measure across diagnoses, severity, and age groups.

Training users in the gross motor function measure: methodological and practical issues.

Background And Purpose: The Gross Motor Function Measure (GMFM) is a criterion-referenced observational measure for assessing change in gross motor function for children with cerebral palsy (CP). The purposes of this report are to present data on the effects of training pediatric developmental therapists to administer and score the GMFM and to discuss some practical and methodological issues associated with training.

Subjects And Methods: A weighted kappa estimate pretraining and posttraining workshop was used to determine participants' agreement of scoring a videotaped GMFM assessment against experts' scoring of the same videotaped assessment.

Measuring physical impairment and disability with the Chedoke-McMaster Stroke Assessment.

Background And Purpose: The Chedoke-McMaster Stroke Assessment measures the physical impairments and disabilities that impact on the lives of individuals with stroke. This measure has three overall purposes: 1) to stage motor recovery to classify individuals in terms of clinical characteristics, 2) to predict rehabilitation outcomes, and 3) to measure clinically important change in physical function. This study was carried out to evaluate the ability of this measure to yield reliable and valid results.

Agonist and antagonist activity during voluntary upper-limb movement in patients with stroke.

Forty-four patients with hemiplegia following stroke and 10 nondisabled subjects were studied to examine the contributions inadequate motor unit recruitment and co-contraction attributable to impaired antagonist inhibition play in the movement disorder of the hemiplegic arm. Electromyographic data were recorded from agonist and antagonist muscles while subjects attempted six specified tasks. Data from subjects who could complete the tasks were compared with those who could not complete the tasks.