Development of Tests for Arm Coordination Impairment in Paralympic Classification.
Viola C Altmann, Nadine Hendriks, Eline A Lammens and 1 others
PMID 36188905WHAT IT FOUND
A pen-and-tablet spiral test produced repeatable movement times for most test conditions in 19 adults without impairments, and movement time tracked task difficulty.
It has not yet been tested in athletes with arm coordination impairment.
Key findings
01Most spiral test conditions showed sufficient test-retest reliability, except the most difficult spiral with the non-dominant arm.
02Movement time was related to spiral difficulty for both arms on both test days, and the pattern matched Fitts's law.
03Post-hoc optimisation of penalty times selected 2.5 s for the dominant arm and 2 s for the non-dominant arm.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
The study included only 19 adults without impairments, so it does not show how the test performs in people with arm coordination impairment. The most difficult spiral with the non-dominant arm did not meet the reliability criterion used by the authors. The penalty times were optimised after the data were collected, so the suggested 2.5 s and 2 s penalties need confirmation. The study did not test athletes who were deliberately underperforming, so it cannot show that the test distinguishes intentional misrepresentation from maximum voluntary effort. No athletes with coordination impairment or sport performance outcomes were included.
Declared interests
The authors declared no commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. A reviewer declared a shared affiliation with one author at the time of review.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that the spiral test is ready to classify arm coordination impairment or detect intentional misrepresentation in athletes. It was only tested in 19 adults without impairments, and the authors state that assessment in athletes with coordination impairment is the next step.