Manual Wheelchair Speed, Maneuverability, and Endurance and Community Access

Summary

This is a cross-section correlational study that will examine the relationships between wheelchair speed, maneuverability, and endurance with community integration. By identifying which of these has the biggest contribution to community participation, the information will be used to justify continues therapy, to alter the focus of therapy, and to justify purchase of power or power assist wheelchairs when needed. Currently, therapists make the recommendation for a power or power assist chair based on their clinical judgement and the patient's experience, but there has been limited justification from the literature for these decisions. Finally, because the CHART measure is the gold standard in rehabilitation research for community integration, but has psychometric problems, we will use this opportunity to validate a new more psychometrically solid measure, the PART-O, against the CHART.

Conditions

• Physical Disability

Interventions

OTHER

Life Space Assessment Scale

This nine question survey asks participants where they have gone in the last week, frequency of those visits, and how independently they went there.

OTHER

6-Minute Push Test

The 6 Minute Push Test is a measure of endurance, and requires that the participant wheel themselves around two pylons that are located 15 meters apart for 6 minutes.

OTHER

Forward Push Test

This measure of wheelchair propulsion speed asks patients to propel themselves as fast as they can over 20 meters. This task is performed twice, and the average time is used for the score.

OTHER

Wheelchair Slalom Test

In this measure, participants propel themselves through an 18 meter slalom course at their maximum self-selected speed, wheeling around seven cones, separated by three, two, or one meter.

OTHER

Craig Handicap Assessment and Reporting Technique

A measure of social participation in individuals with SCI.

OTHER

PART-O

The PART-O is a community participation measure.

OTHER

GPS Tracking

A GPS tracker will be attached to the wheelchairs of a subset of participants for one week. The GPS location is collected every minute, and mapped to Google Maps, which would allow calculation of speed of movement.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Allina Health System

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Nancy Flinn, PhD, OTR/L · Allina Health

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2018-03-31

Primary Completion

2021-02-01

Completion

2021-02-01

Countries

• United States

Study Locations