ArticleEuropean journal of trauma and emergency surgery : official publication of the European Trauma Society2016
The Aachen Mobility and Balance Index to measure physiological falls risk: a comparison with the Tinetti POMA Scale.
Article in European journal of trauma and emergency surgery : official publication of the European Trauma Society, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Multimodal assessment of balance dysfunction in older adults: from classification to clustering-based functional pattern identification.Journal of neuroengineering and rehabilitation · 2026Article
- Qualitative assessment of mobility in older adults: a scoping review of process-oriented behavioural criteria.European review of aging and physical activity : official journal of the European Group for Research into Elderly and Physical Activity · 2026Review
- Medium-Frequency Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation in Critically Ill Patients Promoted Larger Functional Capacity Improvement During Recovery than Low-Frequency Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation: Randomized Clinical Trial.Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Article
- Cross-sectional assessment of the Tinetti performance-oriented mobility tool for screening physical frailty syndrome in older adults.BMC geriatrics · 2025Article
- The prediction model of fall risk for the elderly based on gait analysis.BMC public health · 2024Article
- Effect of a Baduanjin intervention on the risk of falls in the elderly individuals with mild cognitive impairment: a study protocol for a randomized controlled trial.BMC complementary medicine and therapies · 2023Article
- The influence of vitamin D on handgrip strength in elderly trauma patients.European journal of medical research · 2023Article
- Estimating balance, cognitive function, and falls risk using wearable sensors and the sit-to-stand test.Wearable technologies · 2022Article
- Fear of Falling, Recurrence of Falls, and Quality of Life in Patients with a Low Energy Fracture-Part II of an Observational Study.Medicina (Kaunas, Lithuania) · 2021Observational
- Article
- [Evaluation of a simple screening tool for ambulant fall prevention].Der Unfallchirurg · 2018Article
- Satisfying Product Features of a Fall Prevention Smartphone App and Potential Users' Willingness to Pay: Web-Based Survey Among Older Adults.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2018Article
- The "Aachen fall prevention App" - a Smartphone application app for the self-assessment of elderly patients at risk for ground level falls.Patient safety in surgery · 2017Article
- Focus on co-management in geriatric fracture care.European journal of trauma and emergency surgery : official publication of the European Trauma Society · 2016Article
- Excess Body Mass Exacerbates the Association Between Poor Physical Function and Frailty in Older Community Dwelling Adults.Inquiry : a journal of medical care organization, provision and financingArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposeThe most commonly used mobility assessments for screening risk of falls among older adults are rating scales such as the Tinetti performance oriented mobility assessment (POMA). However, its correlation with falls is not always predictable and disadvantages of the scale include difficulty to assess many of the items on a 3-point scale and poor specificity. The purpose of this study was to describe the ability of the new Aachen Mobility and Balance Index (AMBI) to discriminate between subjects with a fall history and subjects without such events in comparison to the Tinetti POMA Scale.
methodsFor this prospective cohort study, 24 participants in the study group and 10 in the control group were selected from a population of patients in our hospital who had met the stringent inclusion criteria. Both groups completed the Tinetti POMA Scale (gait and balance component) and the AMBI (tandem stance, tandem walk, ten-meter-walk-test, sit-to-stand with five repetitions, 360° turns, timed-up-and-go-test and measurement of the dominant hand grip strength). A history of falls and hospitalization in the past year were evaluated retrospectively. The relationships among the mobility tests were examined with Bland-Altmananalysis. Receiver-operated characteristics curves, sensitivity and specificity were calculated.
resultsThe study showed a strong negative correlation between the AMBI (17 points max., highest fall risk) and Tinetti POMA Scale (28 points max., lowest fall risk; r = -0.78, p < 0.001) with an excellent discrimination between community-dwelling older people and a younger control group. However, there were no differences in any of the mobility and balance measurements between participants with and without a fall history with equal characteristics in test comparison (AMBI vs. Tinetti POMA Scale: AUC 0.570 vs. 0.598; p = 0.762). The Tinetti POMA Scale (cut-off <20 points) showed a sensitivity of 0.45 and a specificity of 0.69, the AMBI a sensitivity of 0.64 and a specificity of 0.46 (cut-off >5 points).
conclusionThe AMBI comprises mobility and balance tasks with increasing difficulty as well as a measurement of the dominant hand-grip strength. Its ability to identify fallers was comparable to the Tinetti POMA Scale. However, both measurement sets showed shortcomings in discrimination between fallers and non-fallers based on a self-reported retrospective falls-status.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.