Date of Completion
12-16-2016
Embargo Period
12-16-2016
Advisors
Lindsay DiStefano, Douglas Casa, Thomas Trojian, Carl Maresh
Field of Study
Kinesiology
Degree
Master of Science
Open Access
Open Access
Abstract
Background: ACL injuries are a frequently talked about injury in sports and have a multitude of negative side effects. A majority of injuries occur during single-leg cutting motions. Clinical screening tools are an effective way to identify those demonstrating more ACL injury risk factors. Recent research has created a variety of clinical screening tools to identify ACL injury risk factors, however none screen athletes during a single-leg cutting motion.
Hypothesis: A clinical screening tool using a single-leg cutting motion (the Cutting Screening Tool, or CST) will reliably identify ACL injury risk factors when used by athletic trainers.
Methods: Six currently certified, licensed, and practicing athletic trainers (4 Female, 2 Male; 3 “Novice” with less than five years experience, 3 “Veteran” with more than 10 years experience) in the state of Connecticut were recruited to rate 20 subjects performing three trials of a single-leg cutting task from the frontal and sagittal planes. This data was used to determine inter-rater reliability. After a minimum waiting period of three days, the raters re-scored five subjects a second time to assess intra-rater reliability.
Results: The CST had overall poor inter-rater reliability (ICC(2,1) = 0.32, SEM = 1.42). Inter-rater reliability of specific items on the CST varied from poor to excellent. One system of data reduction (Cohen’s kappa statistic) occasionally had low inter-rater reliability because of high percentage of chance agreement. Intra-rater reliability was moderate when comparing Novice vs. Veteran raters (ICC(2,1) = 0.64, SEM = 0.69) Novice raters had excellent intra-rater reliability (ICC(2,1) = 0.99, SEM = .10) while Veteran raters had poor intra-rater reliability (ICC(2,1) = 0.38, SEM = 1.72). One Veteran rater was removed from certain calculations due to discrepancies in re-scoring subjects.
Conclusions: The CST is not currently ready for use as a clinical screening tool, however it will be a valuable method of identifying those at greater risk for ACL injury following further research.
Recommended Citation
Buckholz Smallbeck, Kelly, "The Inter- and Intra-Rater Reliability of Athletic Trainers at Identifying ACL Injury Risk Factors Using the Cutting Screening Tool" (2016). Master's Theses. 1038.
https://digitalcommons.lib.uconn.edu/gs_theses/1038
Major Advisor
Lindsay DiStefano