The Change in Family Structure and Income for Community-dwelling Patients with Brain Disorders

OBJECTIVE: To find out the changes of the family structure and familial total income of Korean patients with the brain disorders and associated factors. METHOD: A total of 1,903 patients with brain disorders in Korea were enrolled and drew up the questionnaires about their socioeconomic state and family supports, including pre- and post-disorder family structure, compositions of their family income, and employment of caregivers. RESULTS: A 38.2% of subjects experienced the change in numbers of cohabiting family, decrement in 30.3% and increment in 7.9%. Prior to brain disorders, 48.6% of patients earned their living by themselves, but only 2.8% did after brain disorders. Separation and divorce increased, especially three times more in male patients than in females. A 16.6% of patients employed caregivers, and used them 6.2 days per week, 18 hours a day on average. CONCLUSION: This study reemphasized the worsening socioeconomic state of patients with brain disorders and their families. Increasing tendency of social isolation was also noted.

Development of the Korean Version of Modified Barthel Index (K-MBI): Multi-center Study for Subjects with Stroke

OBJECTIVE: To develop a Korean version of Modified Barthel Index (K-MBI) for subjects with stroke and to test the reliability and validity of K-MBI. METHOD: Six senior physiatrists translated the 5th version of MBI into K-MBI and we administered K-MBI to 30 subjects with stroke. Fifteen different examiners working at the 5 different university hospitals evaluated video-recorded examination cases independently to test the reliability and validity of K-MBI. We analyzed intra- and inter-rater reliabilities of the K-MBI by the Kendall's coefficient of concordance and Spearman's correlation coefficients, respectively. Cronbach's alpha coefficient was used for assessing internal consistency of the K-MBI and Spearman's correlation between the K-MBI and Brunnstr?m stage was employed to evaluate the validity of the K-MBI. RESULTS: The intra-rater reliabilities of physiatrists, resident physicians of rehabilitation medicine and occupational therapists were 0.93~1.00, 0.87~0.99, and 0.97~1.00 (p< 0.01), respectively. The inter-rater reliabilities were 0.93~0.98 (p<0.01) and Cronbach's alpha was 0.84 (p<0.01) as the internal consistency reliability of K-MBI. For construct validation study, each item of K-MBI had significant correlation with total score of K-MBI (r=0.54~0.78, p< 0.01). CONCLUSION: The K-MBI is a reliable and valid instrument for measuring functional status of subjects with stroke.

Reliability Test of Korean Version of Berg Balance Scale

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study is to translate the Berg Balance Scale (BBS) to the Korean version (K-BBS) and to evaluate its reliability. METHOD: With the agreement of Katherine Berg, the original editor of the BBS, two physiatrists and three physical therapists had translated the English version of BBS into Korean (K-BBS). This was back-translated into English by a Korean-American physiatrist fluent in English. After a 2- hour K-BBS education course, the video recorded K-BBS of 18 stroke patients were reviewed by nine examiners (four physiatrists and five physical therapists) to assess the inter- rater and the intra-rater reliability. Kendall's correlation coefficient and Pearson's correlation coefficient were computed to assess the intra-rater and test-retest reliability, respectively. RESULTS: The inter-rater reliability was 0.97 at 2 separate evaluations with an interval of 10 days (p<0.05). The intra- rater reliability was 0.95 (p<0.05) in the physiatrist group and 0.97 (p<0.05) in the physical therapist group. CONCLUSION: We recommend that the Korean version of the Berg balance scale is a reliable instrument to be used in balance assessment of stroke patients.