Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool for Spina Bifida Can Predict Ambulation and Transfer Ability in Adults With Spina Bifida.

Objective: The aim of this study was to evaluate the predictive accuracy of the Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool. It was hypothesized that the Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool would have a good overall accuracy (≥80%) for predicting both ambulation and transfer ability and that overall accuracy of the Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool would be higher than that of other scales.

Design: A retrospective chart review was used to classify 409 adults with spina bifida according to seven neurological scales. A Naïve Bayes classifier was used to obtain accuracy estimates for predicting both ambulation and transfer ability as a function of each scale.

Results: The Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool was the only scale demonstrating >80% overall accuracy for predicting both ambulation and transfer ability. While several scales demonstrated ≥80% overall accuracy in predicting transfer ability, none were useful in predicting inability to transfer. Inability to transfer was difficult for all tools to predict.

Conclusions: The Pittsburgh Impairment Testing Tool demonstrated good overall accuracy for predicting both ambulation and transfer ability. Sensory and anatomic levels were less useful than motor level in predicting functional ability.