Inter- and intra-rater reliability, construct validity and feasibility of the independently get off the floor scoring system for Japanese stroke survivors

Although assessment of the capacity to get up from the floor after a fall is considered beneficial in maintaining physical safety for stroke survivors, measurement properties of the Independently Get Off the Floor Scoring System (IGO) for this population is not well established. To translate the IGO into Japanese, and to investigate reliability, construct validity, and feasibility of it for stroke survivors. Sixty-five Japanese stroke survivors participated in this study. This study was designed based on COSMIN standards. The IGO was translated into Japanese using forward and backward translation. For the inter- and intra-rater reliability, weighted Cohen’s kappa values and Fleiss’s kappa values were used. For the construct validity, hypotheses testing method was used. Correlations between the IGO and standard measurements, the Stroke Impairment Assessment Set, knee extensor muscle strength, range of motion in the shoulder and ankle joint, the 5-repetition Sit-To-Stand test, and the Timed Up and Go test were examined using the Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient. The IGO demonstrates moderate inter-rater reliability between three raters (κ = 0.620) and strong to almost perfect reliability between two raters (κ = 0.824 to 0.862) and strong to almost perfect intra-rater reliability for each rater (κ = 0.884 to 0.959). Seven of 8 hypotheses to test construct validity were confirmed. The significant correlation coefficients obtained ranged from 0.345 to 0.633. The IGO is a reliable, valid, and feasible measurement to assess the capacity of stroke survivors to get up from the floor.