Intra and Inter Reliability and Validity of the Turkish Version of Ottowa Sitting Scale in Intensive Care Unit Survivors

In recent years, the mortality rate has decreased in an intensive care unit with the medical and technological developments related to intensive care treatments and the rate of discharge from intensive care unit (ICU) has increased. However, as the length of hospitalization in the intensive care unit prolonged, the functionalities of the patients were restricted due to changes in the musculoskeletal and cardiovascular system. Inactivity, inflammation, the use of pharmacological agents and the presence of neuromuscular syndromes associated with the critical disease lead to decreased muscle dysfunction and exercise tolerance in patients in the intensive care unit. These changes cause the health-related quality of life to be worse in people with critical illness a few months after discharge. Balance; muscle strength is affected by changes in sensory information, postural control and vestibular arrangements from the lower extremity. Studies on equilibrium assessment in different research groups; It includes measurements that assess the seating balance, which does not require complex measurements or ambulation. In the literature, there is no clear information about balance effect in intensive care patients who can not be ambulated due to loss of advanced muscle strength, especially in the early period. The Ottowa Sitting Scale is a scale in which the balance is evaluated in the sitting position and there is no validity and reliability in Turkish. For this reason, the aim of this study is to examine the reliability and validity between measurements and measurements of the Ottowa Sitting Scale's Turkish version. More than one physiotherapist scores patients for validity between the measurements. For the validity of the measurements, a physiotherapist scores the patient twice in two weeks intervals.