Author Of 1 Presentation
P1041 - Longitudinal Changes in Expanded Timed Get Up and Go (ETGUG) and its Association with Patient-Reported Outomes and Other Measures of Disability (ID 1748)
Abstract
Background
The Expanded Timed Get Up and Go (ETGUG) is an objective and clinically useful measure of mobility which is predictive of falls. Previous research showed that ETGUG was a more sensitive predictor of disability, as measured by the Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS), than the Timed-25-Foot-Walk (T25FW).
Objectives
To evaluate correlations of absolute change of ETGUG, EDSS and T25FW in a longitudinal sample and to investigate associations between changes in ETGUG and changes in patient-reported outcomes (PROs).
Methods
Participants in this study are part of the New York State Multiple Sclerosis Consortium (NYSMSC), a 23-year longitudinal registry from MS centers throughout New York State. Participants with available data on the ETGUG, T25FW and EDSS on two visits or more were selected for this study (n=148). To investigate cross-sectional and longitudinal changes in ETGUG scores and its associations with EDSS, T25FW and PROs (as measured by the LIFEware system), Pearson correlation coefficient, chi-squared-, and paired-sample-t-tests were carried out.
Results
The average age of persons with multiple sclerosis (pwMS) in this study was 56.6 (11.0) years, with a disease duration of 21.1 (11.3) years. The majority was female (78.4%), with a mean duration between baseline and follow-up of 32.1 (SD=11.4) months. Baseline ETGUG scores were highly correlated to baseline scores of EDSS and T25FW (r=0.65 and r=0.86, respectively), as well as predictive of EDSS and T25FW at last follow-up (r=0.57 and r=0.60, respectively). Absolute change in ETGUG scores were correlated with absolute change in T25FW (r=0.71) and EDSS (r=0.19). Mean ETGUG scores showed a non-significant improvement from baseline (23.6 ±10.1 seconds) to follow-up (21.7±15.0 seconds), with 17.6% of pwMS worsening over time. Furthermore, pwMS who worsened in ETGUG scores were significantly more likely to report worsening in PROs as well (difficulties in getting up [p=.036], right upper- [p=<.001] and lower limb- problems [p=0.001]).
Conclusions
In the present study, we show that longitudinal changes in ETGUG scores are highly associated with other measures of disability, as well as PROs. Difficulty in walking remains one of the most bothersome limitations in pwMS. Our findings contribute to the ongoing pursuit to find accurate predictors of disability worsening.