Feasibility and Validity of the Coma Recovery Scale-Revised For Accelerated Standardized Testing: A practical assessment tool for detecting consciousness in the intensive care unit.

We developed and validated an abbreviated version of the Coma Recovery Scale-Revised, the CRSR-FAST (CRS-R For Accelerated Standardized Testing), to detect conscious awareness in patients with severe traumatic brain injury (TBI) in the intensive care unit. In 45 consecutively enrolled patients, CRSR-FAST mean[SD] administration time was approximately one third of the full-length CRS-R (6.5 [3.3] vs 20.1 [7.2] minutes, p<0.0001). Concurrent validity (simple kappa=0.68), test-retest (Mak's ρ=0.76), and inter-rater (Mak's ρ=0.91) reliability were substantial. Sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy for detecting consciousness were 81%, 89%, and 84%, respectively. The CRSR-FAST facilitates serial assessment of consciousness, which is essential for diagnostic and prognostic accuracy. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.