Development of ICF Core Sets for Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Project description
With the recent approval of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability, and Health (ICF) by the World Health Assembly there is now an universally accepted framework to classify and describe functioning, disability and health in individuals with a health condition, and, more specifically, with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Since its classification with more than 1400 categories can serve as a reference but is not applicable in clinical practice, tools such as ICF Core Sets are needed to make the ICF useful for medicine. However, ICF Core Sets for individuals with TBI are not available so far.
The objective of the project is the development of ICF Core Sets for Traumatic Brain Injury. The ICF Core Sets will be defined at an ICF Core Set Consensus Conference which will integrate evidence from the following preparatory studies:

(a) Systematic review: The objective of the systematic review is to identify parameters used in studies with individuals with TBI and to identify and quantify the concepts contained in these parameters.

(b) Qualitative study: The objective of the qualitative study is to explore and understand the perspective of individuals with TBI on functioning and health using focus groups and individual interviews and to identify concepts of functioning and health important to these individuals.

(c) Expert survey: The objective of the expert survey is to gather the opinion of experts based on their clinical experience about the most relevant and typical areas to be considered in persons with TBI. Experts from all over the world and from different health professions will be included in the survey.

(d) Cross-sectional study: The objective of the cross-sectional study is to describe functioning and health of patients with TBI using standardized questionnaires to assess the subjective appraisal of health and well-being.
The information collected from these preparatory studies will be presented 2009 in Barcelona to selected experts in the field of TBI. Following a multi-stage decision process, the experts will agree on the ICF categories to be included in the ICF Core Sets for TBI.

The project is coordinated at the Institut Guttmann and is a cooperative effort of the ICF Research Branch of the WHO at the Ludwig-Maximilian University Munich, the Classification, Assessment and Surveys (CAS) team at WHO, and the International Society of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (ISPMR).

For more information please contact Sara Laxe