Use of the Physical Abilities and Mobility Scale (PAMS) in Children Receiving Inpatient Rehabilitation for Spinal Cord Related Paralysis.
Cynthia Salorio, Kelsey Rogers, Erin Neuland and 2 others
PMID 34355633WHAT IT FOUND
The PAMS tracked mobility changes in 146 children with spinal cord disease or injury during inpatient rehabilitation, including young children and chronic injuries.
Scores improved from admission to discharge, but this does not prove a treatment works.
Key findings
01Total PAMS scores and every item score improved from admission to discharge.
02PAMS total scores matched WeeFIM mobility scores more closely than WeeFIM cognitive scores.
03PAMS detected change in children with traumatic and non-traumatic spinal cord injury, in chronic injury, and in children under seven.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
Data came from one pediatric inpatient spinal cord injury rehabilitation unit, so results may not apply to other settings or patient groups. Inter-rater reliability was checked in only 10 children, so it may not reflect all children with spinal cord disease or injury. The study was retrospective and used routine clinical care data, so it cannot show what caused the score changes. The final analysis included 146 children after exclusions from 183 consecutively admitted children, so not all admissions were represented. The group was very heterogeneous, making the clustering of PAMS items harder to interpret. Subgroup analyses were small for chronic injury (n=20) and children under seven (n=31).
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that the PAMS improves patient outcomes or that any rehabilitation therapy caused the score changes. This study only describes scores collected during usual inpatient care, and the case example is one child, not proof that the scale changes treatment.