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The relative and absolute reliability of the Functional Independence and Difficulty Scale in community-dwelling frail elderly Japanese people using long-term care insurance services

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Abstract

Background

The newly developed Functional Independence and Difficulty Scale is a tool for assessing the performance of basic activities of daily living in terms of both independence and difficulty. The reliability of this new scale has not been assessed.

Aims

The aim of this study was to examine the relative reliability and absolute reliability of the newly developed scale in community-dwelling frail elderly people in Japan.

Methods

Participants were 47 community-dwelling elderly subjects (22 for assessing test–retest reliability and 25 for assessing inter-rater reliability). As relative reliability indices, intra-class correlation coefficients were used. From an absolute reliability perspective, we conducted Bland–Altman analysis and calculated the limit of agreement or minimal detectable change to determine the acceptable range of error.

Results

Intra-class correlation coefficients for test–retest and inter-rater reliability were 0.90 (P < 0.001) and 0.97 (P < 0.001), respectively. The limit of agreement for test–retest reliability was −5.2 to 1.8, representing an increase of over six points for improvement and a decrease of over two points for decline of basic activities of daily living ability. The minimal detectable change for inter-rater reliability was 3.7, indicating that a three-point difference might be existed between difference raters. The results of this study demonstrated that the FIDS appeared to be a reliable instrument for use in Japanese community-dwelling frail elderly people.

Conclusions

While further research using a large and more diverse sample of participants is needed, our findings support the use of FIDS in clinical practice or clinical research targeting frail elderly Japanese people.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank all of the subjects who participated in the study. We also thank the staff of the Department of Rehabilitation of the Visiting Nursing and Rehabilitation Network for their help with data collection.

Authors’ contribution

T. S. and S. W. designed the study, collected and analyzed the data, interpreted the results and prepared the manuscript. K. I. and S. W. supervised data analysis and manuscript preparation.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Doctoral Course of Gerontology, Graduate School of Gerontology, J. F. Oberlin University, 3758 Tokiwa-machi, Machida-shi, Tokyo, 194-0294, Japan

    Takashi Saito

  2. Graduate School of Health Sciences, Kobe University, Kobe, Japan

    Kazuhiro P. Izawa

  3. Graduate School of Gerontology, J. F. Oberlin University, Tokyo, Japan

    Shuichiro Watanabe

Authors
  1. Takashi Saito
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  2. Kazuhiro P. Izawa
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  3. Shuichiro Watanabe
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Takashi Saito.

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Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

The study protocol was approved by the ethics committee of J. F. Oberlin University (approval no. 14036). The participants received oral and written explanations of the research procedures by the researchers. Participation in the study was voluntary.

Statement of human and animal rights

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Saito, T., Izawa, K.P. & Watanabe, S. The relative and absolute reliability of the Functional Independence and Difficulty Scale in community-dwelling frail elderly Japanese people using long-term care insurance services. Aging Clin Exp Res 29, 549–556 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-016-0577-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40520-016-0577-7

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