The RMI was originally developed to measure mobility for patients with acquired brain injury (Hseih et al. 2000). It evaluates patients’ bed mobility, postural transfers, and walking ability. The RMI covers a range of activities, from turning over in bed to running (Hseih et al. 2000).

Number of items: 15-item scale: 14 questions and one direct observation

Procedure/Administration: The RMI uses a combined interview and observation format.

How scored: Question 5 requires the patient to stand for 10 seconds without any aid. The other questions require the patient to respond either yes (scored 1) or no (scored 0). For question 5, if the subject can stand for 10 seconds, a response of ‘yes’ is indicated.

Interpretability: Scores for the 15 items are summed. The range of scores is between 0 (poor mobility) and 15 (good mobility). No information is available regarding norms or meaningful cut scores.

Acceptability: N/a

Languages: N/a

Usability: Several questions refer to either walking or running which may not be appropriate for all SCI patients.

Time to administer: 3-5 minutes

Time to score: N/a

Training required: N/a

Availability: N/a

Equipment required: N/a

Summary:

• The RMI is simple and quick to complete making it easy to perform in the home, institutional or office settings. There is minimal patient or clinician burden.

Psychometric Summary

Note: TR= Test re-test; IC= Internal Consistency; Inter-O= Inter-observer; Intra-O= Intra-observer; SS= Sensitivity/Specificity; N/a= No information.

Red light= A single study involving SCI subjects which has less than adequate findings of reliability, validity, and/or responsiveness.

Yellow light= A single study involving subjects with SCI which has adequate to excellent findings of reliability, validity, and/or responsiveness.

Green light= At least 2 studies involving subjects with SCI which have adequate to excellent findings of reliability, validity, and/or responsiveness.

* correlated with WISCI, SCIM, FIM and BI.

References

• Forlander DA, Bohannon RW. Rivermead Mobility Index: a brief review of research to date. Clinical Rehabilitation 1999; 13: 97-100.
• Hsieh CL, Hsueh IP, Mao HF. Validity and responsiveness of the Rivermead Mobility Index in stroke patients. Scand J Rehab Med 2000; 32: 140-142.
• Morganti B, Scivoletto G, Ditunno P, Ditunno JF, Molinari M. Walking Index for spinal cord injury (WISCI): criterion validation. Spinal Cord 2005;43:27-33.