Objective: To quantify the agreement between functional assessments by a single rater and a team using the Chinese version of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health Rehabilitation Set in a clinical situation.
Design: Inter-rater, multi-centre agreement study.
Subjects: A total of 193 adult inpatients admitted to 5 rehabilitation centres at 5 hospitals in China Methods: The Chinese version of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health Rehabilitation Set was used by either a single rater or a team to assess 193 patients at 5 Chinese hospitals. Percentage of agreement and quadratic-weighted kappa coefficients were computed. Evaluation times were compared with paired t-tests.
Results: The mean team and individual evaluation times were not significantly different. The percentage of agreement ranged from 46.1% to 94.2% depending on the item, and the quadratic-weighted kappas ranged from 0.43 to 0.92. Eight categories (26.6%) showed a weighted kappa exceeding 0.4, 11 others (36.7%) exceeded 0.6, and another 11 (36.7%) produced kappas of more than 0.8.
Conclusion: Either a single rater or a team of raters can produce valid and consistent ratings when using the Chinese version of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health Rehabilitation Set to assess patients in a rehabilitation department. The team rating approach is suitable for clinical application.