The Assisting Hand Assessment, a new perspective on evaluating hand function in children with unilateral impairments.

The Assisting Hand Assessment (AHA) is a new Rasch-based instrument, which measures and describes the effectiveness with which a child who has unilateral disability makes use of his/her affected hand (assisting hand) during bimanual activities. The AHA is performed as an enjoyable 10 to 15 minute semi-structured play session using toys requiring bimanual use. The AHA is then scored from structured video recordings of the observable performance skills during this play. The AHA measurement contains twenty-two items on a four-point rating scale. AHA is a standardized test intended for children with Cerebral Palsy-hemiplegia or Brachial Plexus Palsy between the ages of 18 months and 12 years.

AHA was evaluated for evidence of reliability and validity using a Rasch measurement analysis. This confirmed the test rationale, that the usefulness of the assisting hand forms a uni-dimensional construct, and that the items tested the phenomenon appropriately (Krumlinde-Sundholm & Eliasson 2003) . Validity and reliability for use with children up to 12 years has been demonstrated (Krumlinde-Sundholm et al. 2007) . Different aspects of reliability have been investigated and found to be excellent (Holmefur et al. 2007, Holmefur et al 2009). The AHA has been used as the principal outcome measure e.g. in studies evaluating Constraint Induced Movement Therapy in young children with hemiplegia (Eliasson et al., 2005) and has demonstrated evidence of responsiveness to change. With the AHA longitudinal development of hand function has been studied (Holmefur et al. 2010) Welcome to visit the web site www.ahanetwork.se for more information.

The course teaches the Assisting Hand Assessment Version 4.4. It is conducted in two steps. First, a 2 1/2 day training course is given including information about the test construct, testing procedure and scoring practice on a range of children from videos. A manual with detailed scoring criteria and a computer based scoring form is provided. To achieve certification, the participant is to complete eight calibration cases and get satisfactory results. Some of these from videotapes distributed at the course, and some self-produced AHA play sessions. Individual feedback of these cases is provided. The AHA test kit for children between 18 months and 12 years with specific toys can be ordered at the course or later during the certification procedure.

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

Upon completion of this course, participants will be able to:

Demonstrate the set up, conduct and video record an Assisting Hand Assessment session and produce reliable scores according to the criteria in the manual
Verbalize the concept and construct of the test and its psychometric properties
Interpret and communicate the outcome of the test.

Instructor:

Lena Krumlinde-Sundholm, Reg OT, PhD, is an Occupational Therapist and a researcher at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.

If interested please contact Jasmine Gilliam or Rachel Galant at:
jgilliam@shrinenet.org 773-385-5875
rgalant@shrinenet.org 773-385-5575

This course is filled, however, they are encouraging you to put your name on a wait list. They anticipate cancellations or spots opening up.