Reliability and feasibility of methods to quantitatively assess peripheral edema

Resource type
Authors/contributors
Title
Reliability and feasibility of methods to quantitatively assess peripheral edema
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate methods to assess peripheral edema for reliability, feasibility and correlation with the classic clinical assessment of pitting edema. DESIGN: Cross-sectional observational study. SETTING: Large primary care clinic in Marshfield, Wisconsin, USA. PARTICIPANTS: Convenience sample of 20 patients with type 2 diabetes and a range of edema severity, including patients without edema. METHODS: Eight methods of edema assessment were evaluated: (1) clinical assessment of pit depth and recovery at three locations, (2) patient questionnaire, (3) ankle circumference, (4) figure-of-eight (ankle circumference using eight ankle/foot landmarks), (5) edema tester (plastic card with holes of varying size pressed to the ankle with a blood pressure cuff), (6) modified edema tester (edema tester with bumps), (7) indirect leg volume (by series of ankle/leg circumferences), and (8) foot/ankle volumetry by water displacement. Patients were evaluated independently by three nurse examiners. RESULTS: Water displacement and ankle circumference had high inter-examiner agreement (intraclass correlation coefficient 0.93, 0.96 right; 0.97, 0.97 left). Agreement was inconsistent for figure-of-eight (0.64, 0.86), moderate for indirect leg volume (0.53, 0.66), and low for clinical assessments at all locations. Agreement was low for the edema testers but varied by the pressure administered. Correlation with the classic, subjective clinical assessment was good for the nurse-performed assessments and patient questionnaire. Ankle circumference and patient questionnaires each took 1 minute to complete. Other tools took >5 minutes to complete. CONCLUSIONS: Water displacement and ankle circumference showed excellent reliability; however, water displacement is a time-consuming measure and may pose implementation challenges in the clinical and clinical trial environments. Patient-reported level and frequency of edema, based on an unvalidated questionnaire, was generally well correlated with the physician assessment of edema severity and may prove to be another reliable and accurate method of assessing edema. Additional study is needed to evaluate the validity and responsiveness of these methods.
Publication
Clinical Medicine & Research
Volume
7
Issue
1-2
Pages
21-31
Date
2009-06
Journal Abbr
Clin Med Res
Language
eng
ISSN
1554-6179
Library Catalog
PubMed
Citation
Brodovicz, K. G., McNaughton, K., Uemura, N., Meininger, G., Girman, C. J., & Yale, S. H. (2009). Reliability and feasibility of methods to quantitatively assess peripheral edema. Clinical Medicine & Research, 7(1–2), 21–31. https://doi.org/10.3121/cmr.2009.819
Publication