Korean Version of the ABILOCO Questionnaire in the Assessment of Locomotion in Hemiplegic Stroke Patients

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the intra- and inter-rater reliability of the Korean version of the ABILOCO questionnaire (K-ABILOCO). METHODS: The original ABILOCO questionnaire was translated into Korean and back-translated into English. Stroke patients (n=30) with hemiplegia were evaluated using the K-ABILOCO at one week interval. At each visit, the physiatrist also evaluated patient performance of the activities described in the K-ABILOCO, and the total logit scores were recorded. The total scores were used to evaluate intraclass correlation (ICC). Test-retest scores and each test scores were compared to obtain the intra- and inter-rater reliability. RESULTS: The K-ABILOCO showed good intra-rater correlation at one week interval in both patient and physiatrist evaluations (ICC=0.81, 0.91), respectively. It also showed a high inter-rater correlation between the patient and physiatrist at both the first and second visits (ICC=0.76, 0.84), respectively. CONCLUSION: The K-ABILOCO is a useful tool that may reliably evaluate the locomotion ability in hemiplegic stroke patients.

Painful Os Peroneum Syndrome Presenting as Lateral Plantar Foot Pain

Lateral plantar foot pain can be caused by various entities, and the painful os peroneum syndrome should be considered in the differential diagnosis. Recent developments in musculoskeletal ultrasonography are very useful for initial diagnosis. We discuss a 69-year-old female who experienced lateral plantar foot pain for over one month. Through physical examination, radiography, ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging, she was diagnosed with the painful os peroneum syndrome with a chronic fatigue fracture of multipartite os peroneum and peroneus longus tenosynovitis, for which she underwent surgery. We herein report this rare condition and reviewed the relevant literature.

Effect of Botulinum Toxin A on Trismus after Pons Infarction: A case report

We report a 77-year-old woman with bilateral pons infarction who presented with severe trismus, which was responsive to botulinum toxin-A injection. She was unable to open her mouth and showed anterior displacement of her temporo-mandibular (TM) joint on MRI findings. She was fed via nasogastric tube because of mouth opening limitation. There was no improvement of her mouth opening after range of motion exercise. She underwent closed reduction of the TM joints under general anesthesia but there was no significant improvement. Electromyography studies revealed continuous muscle activities on masseter and temporalis muscles during mouth opening. Botulinum toxin-A (Botox(R)) was injected into both the masseter and left temporalis muscles under ultrasonographic guidance. There was some improvement in mouth opening at post-injection 5 days. The inter-incisal distance improved gradually, and she could start oral feeding after 18 days. She could maintain an inter-incisal distance of 1.8 cm with favorable response during post-injection 4 months.