Clinical measures of musculoskeletal foot and ankle assessment: an international consensus statement

Abstract

There is no clear consensus on the methods to assess the status of the foot and ankle within musculoskeletal disease management.

Objectives: To use evidence driven approach to identify a core set of objective musculoskeletal foot and ankle assessment measures to inform a protocol applicable to clinical and research circumstances.

Methods: Nineteen experts from podiatry, rheumatology, physiotherapy, and orthopaedics were included in a Delphi exercise to reach consensus on a core set of clinical foot and ankle musculoskeletal assessment measures. Future research agendas were defined via a face to face expert meeting and strength of recommendation scores were established for each agreed measure.

Results: Following a four round Delphi exercise, ninety-five foot and ankle measures were reduced to a final list of twenty. Future research agendas for validity testing were proposed. Strength of recommendation scores were provided to give an indicated level of recommendation for the use of each measure within clinical and research setting.

Conclusion: The study has provided an expertly derived core set of musculoskeletal foot and ankle assessment measures, applicable for research and clinical use. These are recommended for musculoskeletal screening purposes of the foot and ankle within the clinical and research setting. Using a consensus derived set of measures is a useful step towards a common minimum dataset and improved comparability between studies. Further work is now required to test these measures for validity and reliability in order to define the measures to be included within a foot and ankle assessment tool.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Lucy S. Gates: orcid.org/0000-0002-8627-3418

ORCID for Catherine J. Bowen: orcid.org/0000-0002-7252-9515

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