Designing, Fabricating, and Testing the Validity and Reliability of the Digital Headband for Cervical Proprioception Assessment: A Descriptive Study

Background and Objectives: Accuracy of proprioceptive input plays an important role in cervical motor control. Several methods have been used to evaluate the accuracy of proprioceptive input as a factor of cervical injury prevention or rehabilitation. The aim of this study was to introduce a new tool for evaluating the accuracy of cervical proprioception and determine its validity and reliability. Materials and Methods: In this descriptive study, 40 men aged 18-60 years were selected as subjects based on inclusion and exclusion criteria, and their cervical repositioning errors were evaluated by using Digital Headband and Cervical Range of Motion (CROM) device as a gold standard in measuring cervical angles. After collecting the required information, Pearson’s correlation coefficient and intra-class correlation coefficient (ICC) were used in order to determine the validity and intra-rater and inter-rater reliability, respectively. Results: The results showed that Digital Headband has a very high validity (r: 0.84-0.89) and great intra-rater and inter-rater reliability (ICC: 0.89-0.94 and ICC: 0.87-0.93, respectively) for assessing the accuracy of cervical proprioception (p<0.05). Conclusion: Digital Headband as an accurate, cost-effective, and easy-to-use tool, providing cervical proprioceptive information in the shortest time, can be a good alternative to other methods of cervical proprioception assessment. Key words: Digital Headband, Proprioception, Neck, Validity, Reliability Funding: This study was funded by Lorestan University of Medical Sciences. Conflict of interest: None declared. Ethical approval: The Ethics Committee of Lorestan University of Medical Sciences approved the study (IR.LUMS.REC.1399.386). How to cite this article: Beyranvand Ramin, Hosseini Seyed Mohammad, Mirnasouri Rahim, Abdipour Monfared Mohammad Hossein. Designing, Fabricating, and Testing the Validity and Reliability of the Digital Headband for Cervical Proprioception Assessment: A Descriptive Study. J Rafsanjan Univ Med Sci 2022; 21 (9): 911-22. [Farsi]