Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2011 Sep;6(3):150-7.

Differences in change scores and the predictive validity of three commonly used measures following concussion in the middle school and high school aged population

Michael Barlow, Drew Schlabach, Jeffery Peiffer, Chad Cook

Differences in change scores and the predictive validity of three commonly used measures following concussion in the middle school and high school aged population

Michael Barlow et al. Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2011 Sep.

Erratum in

  • Erratum: ERRATUM.
    [No authors listed] [No authors listed] Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2011 Dec;6(4):361. Int J Sports Phys Ther. 2011. PMID: 22163098 Free PMC article.

Abstract

Background: A battery of tests is commonly used to measure disability with and recovery from concussion. A number of different concussion-oriented assessment tests exist and each is considered useful. To the authors' knowledge, no study has compared the scores of these tests during recovery in the middle school and high school aged population to see how each change over time.

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to analyze clinical data of concussed middle school and high school aged athletes to determine the concurrent and predictive validity for post-concussion syndrome (PCS) of the Post-Concussion Symptom Scale (PCSS), Balance Error Scoring System (BESS), and the five subscales of the Immediate Post-Concussion Assessment and Cognitive Testing (ImPACT).

Methods: The study was a retrospective chart review performed on middle school and high school aged individuals with a diagnosis of concussion from the years 2008-2010 within the Akron Children's Hospital Sports Medicine system. To be eligible for inclusion in the dataset, each subject required a baseline measurement for each of the three tests (and all five subscales of the ImPACT) and a post-test measure. The mean age of the population was 15.38 years (SD = 1.7) and ranged from 11 to 19 years. Pearson product correlation tests (correlation matrix) were used to analyze the concurrent validity of the test items during recovery following a concussion. Receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curves were used to determine the predictive validity of initial scores for developing PCS.

Results: The correlation matrix captured five statistically significant findings; however, these suggested only weak to mild correlations. Five test items yielded an area under the curve (AUC) greater than 0.50 but only one was statistically significant. After qualitative evaluation, only one of the three tests (including the five subscales of the ImPACT) was useful in predicting post-concussion syndrome.

Conclusion: This study suggests that there is poor concurrent validity among three commonly used concussion tests and there is no baseline score that predicts whether post-concussion syndrome will occur.

Level of evidence: 2b.

Keywords: Concussion; Diagnostic accuracy; Post-concussion syndrome; Validity.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. Faul MXu LWald MMCoronado VG. Traumatic brain injury in the United States: emergency department visits, hospitalizations, and deaths. Atlanta (GA): Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control; 2010
    1. Preiss-Farzanegan SChapman BWong TWu JBazarian J. The relationship between gender and postconcussion symptoms after sport-related mild traumatic brain injury. PMR 2009;1:245–53 - PMC - PubMed
    1. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Physical activity levels among children aged 9–13 years: United States, 2002. MMWR Morb mortal Wkly Rep 2003;52:785–8 - PubMed
    1. Howard BGillis J. High School Sports Participation Increases for 20th Consecutive Year. National Federation of State High School Associations. Sept 2009. Available at http://www.nfhs.org/content.aspx?id=3505 Accessed June 15, 2010.
    1. McCrory PMeeuwisse WJohnston Ket al. Consensus statement on concussion in sport: The 3rd International Conference on Concussion in Sport held in Zurich, November 2008. J Athl Train 2009;44:434–8 - PMC - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources