Assessment Overview

Purpose: The 10 meter walk test (10MWT) is an outcome measure used to assess walking speed in meters per second. The patient is asked to walk from point A to point B, a distance of 10 meters, at their normal walking speed. Individuals can also do the test at a fast

Equipment: Stopwatch, marked pathway

ICF Category: Activity

Assessment Handout

Assessment Psychometrics

Stroke

The 10MWT is highly recommended for use in those with acute, subacute, or chronic strokes and is highly recommended for use in acute care, inpatient rehabilitation, skilled nursing facilities, outpatient rehabilitation, and home health. This measure should be taught to students and is appropriate for use in research.

There are multiple methods of administering the 10MWT, clinicians should be consistent in their use of the 6MWT with patients to measure change over time. In addition there is value in collecting data for both self-selected and maximum walking speeds.

• Concurrent Validity: Excellent correlation between comfortable gait speed and TUG (ICC=-0.84), FGS (ICC=0.92), stair ascent (ICC=-0.81), stair descent (ICC=-0.82), Excellent correlation between fast gait speed and TUG (ICC=-0.91), CGS (ICC=0.88), stair ascent (ICC=-0.84), stair descent (ICC=-0.87)

• Construct Validity: Excellent correlation with BBS (r=0.627), Adequate correlation with FRT (r=0.349)

• Criterion Validity: Excellent correlation with dependence in instrumental activities of daily living (r=0.76), Excellent correlation with Barthel Index (r=0.78)

• Cutoff Score: < 0.4 m/s likely to be household ambulators, 0.4 - 0.8 m/s limited community ambulators, > 0.8 m/s community ambulators

• Floor/Ceiling Effects: None reported

• Interrater Reliability: Excellent (ICC=0.87-0.88)

• Intrarater Reliability: Excellent (ICC=0.998)

• MCID: 0.16 m/s

• Mean Data: Mean 0.84 +/- 0.3 m/s

• Responsiveness: Small meaningful change = 0.05 m/s, Substantial meaningful change = 0.10 m/s

• SEM: 0.04m/s

• Test-retest: Excellent reliability for comfortable (ICC=0.94) and fast (ICC=0.97) gait speeds

Parkinson's Disease

The 10MWT is highly recommended for use with PD patients in Hoehn and Yahr stages I-III, recommended for use with patients in Hoehn and Yahr stage IV and not recommended in Hoehn and Yahr stage V. This measure should be taught to students and is appropriate for use in research.

There are multiple methods of administering the 10MWT, clinicians should be consistent in their use of the 10MWT with patients to measure change over time. In addition there is value in collecting data for both self-selected and maximum walking speeds.

• MDC: Comfortable gait speed: 0.18 m/s; Fastest gait speed: 0.25 m/s

• Test-retest: Excellent with comfortable gait speed (ICC=0.96)⁷ ; Excellent with maximum gait speed (ICC=0.97)

Spinal Cord Injury

According to Neuro PT Edge recommendations, the 10MWT is highly recommended (4/4) for individuals with acute, subacute, and chronic SCI diagnoses. It is highly recommended for motor incomplete (AIS C and D) diagnoses, but only reasonable to use (2/4) for those with a motor complete (AIS A and B) diagnosis. The specific settings for this test to be administered in this population have not been supported by research as of late. Students should learn to administer this test, and this test can be used in research studies. The psychometric properties for the 10MWT are presented below.

• Construct Validity: Excellent correlation with the TUG (r=0.89) ; Excellent correlation with the 6MWT (r=-0.95)

• Content Validity: Valid/useful

• Interrater Reliability: Excellent, r=0.97; Excellent, ICC>0.95

• Intrarater Reliability: Excellent, ICC >0.98; Excellent, r=0.98

• MCID : 0.06 m/s

• MDC : 0.13 m/s

• Responsiveness : Responsive between 1-6 months, but not after 6 months

• SEM : 0.05 m/s; 0.07 m/s

• Test-retest Ability : Excellent, ICC=0.97; Excellent, r= 0.98

• No cut-off value has been established to determine fallers from non-fallers in the SCI population specifically.

Traumatic Brain Injury

The 10MWT is recommended for use in patients after brain injury who are completely independent. There is not yet evidence to recommend use for those that are mildly or moderately dependent and it is not recommended for those who are severely dependent. The 10MWT has limited studies on use in acute care, skilled nursing facilities, and home health but is recommended for use in inpatient rehabilitation and outpatient rehabilitation. This measure should be taught to students and is appropriate for use in research.

There are multiple methods of administering the 10MWT, clinicians should be consistent in their use of the 10MWT with patients to measure change over time. In addition there is value in collecting data for both self-selected and maximum walking speeds.

• Interrater Reliability: Excellent (ICC=0.99)

• MCID: > 0.15 m/s (comfortable), > 0.25 m/s (fast-paced)

• MDC: > 0.05 seconds

• Test-retest: Excellent for comfortable (ICC=0.95) and fast speeds (ICC=0.96)