Assessment of Upper Extremity Role Functioning in Students

Details

• Personal Author:
  Amick BC III ; Coley CM ; Cortes MC ; Fossel AH ; Hupert N ; Katz JN ; Robertson M
• Description:
  BACKGROUND: Upper extremity symptoms associated with use of computers and other upper extremity activities are common in students. Research on these disorders requires psychometrically sound measures of health-related student role function; no such measure is available currently. METHODS: Based upon input from students and clinicians, we developed a 10-item scale to measure student health-related role function. The measure was administered as part of a survey of 193 undergraduates at one university. A follow-up survey was administered 1 month later. The student health-related role function questionnaire was assessed for internal consistency, ceiling effects, convergent and discriminant validity, and responsiveness to self-reported change in functional status. RESULTS: Eighty-two percent of students who were given the survey completed it and 65% completed a follow-up survey 1 month later. The new measure was reliable (Cronbach's alpha 0.87). Forty-six percent of respondents reported "no difficulty" on all items of the health-related student role function measure while 64% reported "no difficulty" on all items of a generic upper extremity functional status measure. This finding indicates that the new measure was better able to detect functional limitations; it had a less prominent ceiling effect. The new measure had moderately high correlations with measures of symptom severity and pain, documenting convergent validity. It distinguished students who utilized clinician services, medications, or academic accommodation from students who did not utilize these resources, documenting discriminant validity. The measure was responsive to self-perceived change, as demonstrated by a highly significant association (P < 0.0001) between changes in score over a 1-month follow-up and students' perceptions of whether they had improved in functional abilities after the month, deteriorated or remained stable. CONCLUSIONS: The student health-related role functioning measure is reliable, valid and responsive to change. It is an appropriate measure for research on upper extremity symptoms in students. [Description provided by NIOSH]
• Subjects:
  Ergonomics Health Care Facilities Workforce And Services Musculoskeletal Diseases Occupational Health Safety Surveys And Questionnaires
• Keywords:
  Health-surveys Humans Medical-monitoring Models Musculoskeletal-system-disorders Physical-fitness Physical-stress Questionnaires Statistical-analysis
• ISSN:
  0271-3586
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  Grant
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  Massachusetts ; New York ; OSHA Region 1 ; OSHA Region 2 ; OSHA Region 6 ; Texas
• CIO:
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)
• Topic:
  Workplace Safety & Health
• Location:
  North America
• Pages in Document:
  19-26
• Volume:
  41
• Issue:
  1
• NIOSHTIC Number:
  nn:20029531
• Citation:
  Am J Ind Med 2002 Jan; 41(1):19-26
• Contact Point Address:
  Jeffrey N. Katz, Division of Rheumatology, Immunology and Allergy, Brigham and Women's Hospital, 75 Francis Street, B-3, Boston, Massachusetts 02115
• Email:
  jnkatz@partners.org
• Federal Fiscal Year:
  2002
• NORA Priority Area:
  Work Environment And Workforce: Organization of Work
• Performing Organization:
  University of Texas, School of Public Health, Houston Health Science Center, Houston, Texas
• Peer Reviewed:
  True
• Start Date:
  19990930
• Source Full Name:
  American Journal of Industrial Medicine
• End Date:
  20020929
• Collection(s):
  National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:46677987e098308adb4c1085f7b6870079aa6d247083d9704eea5002f61799480c1accb33a0f23c4721e2c037886068d19d7beeebfb152491db8b7ffae61d7ce
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/190487/cdc_190487_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 186.46 KB ]