Boledi K Maleka1, Jeannie Van Der Linde1, Frances Page Glascoe2, De Wet Swanepoel1,3,4. 1. 1 Department of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology, University of Pretoria , Pretoria, South Africa . 2. 2 Department of Pediatrics, Vanderbilt University , Nashville, Tennessee. 3. 3 Ear Sciences Centre, School of Surgery, The University of Western Australia , Nedlands, Australia . 4. 4 Australia Ear Science Institute Australia , Subiaco, Australia .
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Developmental delays are more prevalent in low-income countries and access to developmental screening is severely limited. INTRODUCTION: This study evaluated an m-Health version of a standard developmental screening tool, Parents Evaluation Developmental Status (PEDS) and PEDS:Developmental Milestones (PEDS:DM) for use by community health workers (CHWs) in terms of (1) correspondence with conventional paper-based testing by a speech language pathologist (SLP) and (2) inter-rater reliability compared to an SLP. METHOD: CHWs were trained in a primary healthcare (PHC) setting to administer the newly developed smartphone application version of the PEDS tools. One SLP and two CHWs recruited 207 caregivers who were attending a baby wellness clinic. Caregivers were tested by one CHW using the smartphone application of the PEDS tools; a qualified SLP simultaneously recorded and scored the PEDS tools on the same participants. RESULTS: High positive (100%) and negative correspondence (96%) was found between the paper-based PEDS tools and the smartphone application PEDS tools and between the SLP and CHW. Almost perfect (Cohen's Kappa) inter-rater agreement between conditions was demonstrated (κ = 0.873 to κ = 0.961). CONCLUSION: Outcomes of the smartphone application, operated by a CHW, corresponded closely to the gold standard PEDS tools operated by a health professional. Trained CHWs can conduct accurate developmental screening using the smartphone version of the PEDS tools.
BACKGROUND: Developmental delays are more prevalent in low-income countries and access to developmental screening is severely limited. INTRODUCTION: This study evaluated an m-Health version of a standard developmental screening tool, Parents Evaluation Developmental Status (PEDS) and PEDS:Developmental Milestones (PEDS:DM) for use by community health workers (CHWs) in terms of (1) correspondence with conventional paper-based testing by a speech language pathologist (SLP) and (2) inter-rater reliability compared to an SLP. METHOD: CHWs were trained in a primary healthcare (PHC) setting to administer the newly developed smartphone application version of the PEDS tools. One SLP and two CHWs recruited 207 caregivers who were attending a baby wellness clinic. Caregivers were tested by one CHW using the smartphone application of the PEDS tools; a qualified SLP simultaneously recorded and scored the PEDS tools on the same participants. RESULTS: High positive (100%) and negative correspondence (96%) was found between the paper-based PEDS tools and the smartphone application PEDS tools and between the SLP and CHW. Almost perfect (Cohen's Kappa) inter-rater agreement between conditions was demonstrated (κ = 0.873 to κ = 0.961). CONCLUSION: Outcomes of the smartphone application, operated by a CHW, corresponded closely to the gold standard PEDS tools operated by a health professional. Trained CHWs can conduct accurate developmental screening using the smartphone version of the PEDS tools.