Content - Volume 29, Issue 4

The relationship between different degrees of institutionalization in the care of the elderly (service house, home care, and a combination of both) and work-load, as well as staff feelings regarding psychosocial variables and health complaints, was investigated. Seventy-one staff members similar in background factors answered questionnaires semi-annually during a period of 3 years. The results rev ...

The aim of this study was to find predictors of length of time on sick-leave and the change in sick-leave as a result of intervention. Many studies of back pain show that medical and psychosocial factors covary with length of sick-leave. The results are based on the questionnaire responses of 240 patients. A stepwise multiple regression showed that the significant predictors of number of sick-days ...

The purpose of this study was to determine whether subjects with knee osteoarthritis (OA) had reduced muscle strength at various muscle lengths, endurance, contraction velocity and functional capacity, compared with control subjects and whether the decrease was related to functional capacity. Forty-five men and 45 women with knee OA were compared with a control group (41 males, 63 females) of simi ...

To explore and describe how shoulder, elbow and wrist movement impairment and age, disease duration, disease activity and shoulder-upper arm pain are associated with disability in rheumatoid arthritis, these variables were investigated in 63 females. Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that limitations in functional shoulder-arm movement and in active wrist motion ranges explained 30-35% ...

The aim was to describe the application of a non-parametric method to a study of changes in activities of daily living (ADL) measured by a 10-level ordinal scale, the Staircase of ADL, in a population of 70-year-old persons followed to the age of 76 (n = 371). The statistical method takes account of the fact that change cannot be defined by differences and can separately measure the level of chang ...

Changes in skin temperature and haemodynamics were studied during experimentally administered electro-acupuncture before and after a 4-week period of electro-acupuncture (EA) treatments. Subjective pain intensity was evaluated using a pain questionnaire. Twelve patients with long-lasting nociceptive pain were included. Before clinical treatment, skin temperature tended to decrease after 30 minutes ...

The aim of this study was to compare different muscle contraction types in Parkinson patients and controls. Ten patients with mild to moderate Parkinsonism (7 men, 3 women, mean age 62. 3) and 11 controls (7 men, 4 women, mean age 66. 0) were investigated. Measurements in eccentric, concentric contraction and stretch-shortening contraction were made using modified Cybex 11 equipment. The torque ar ...

To assess changes in postural control among healthy elderly and to correlate with suspected age-related events, 33 women and 16 men were studied. Postural control was evaluated by vibration-induced body sway, measured on a force platform, and vibration sensation was tested with a tuning fork. Occurrence of spontaneous gaze and head-shake-induced nystagmus was observed with infrared charged couple ...

To summarize, we take issue with the criticisms of Dickson & Köhler for two main reasons: 1. Rasch analysis provides a model from which to approach the analysis of the FIM, an ordinal scale, as an interval scale. The existence of examples of items or individuals which do not fit the model does not disprove the overall efficacy of the model; and 2. the principal components analysis of FIM motor it ...