Reliability of the Japanese version of the scale for the assessment and rating of ataxia (SARA)

Background: The International Cooperative Ataxia Rating Scale (ICARS) is widely used as a scale for the assessment of the severity of cerebellar ataxia. However, this scale comprises several items; thus, making the application of this scale is not sufficiently practical to perform daily assessment of ataxic patients. A new rating scale - Scale for the Assessment and Rating of Ataxia (SARA) - was shown to provide highly reliable assessments; further, the scores on SARA correlated with the ICARS score and the Barthel index. After obtaining the permission, original SARA was translated into Japanese. Objective and Methods: To examine the reliability and internal consistency of the Japanese version of the SARA for the assessment of cerebellar ataxia in 66 patients with spinocerebellar degeneration. Results: Intraclass coefficients (ICC) were observed to be greater than 0.8 except in the case of the inter-rater "finger chase" and "fast alternating hand movement" tests. Conclusions: The Japanese version of SARA is highly reliable and very useful for the assessment of cerebellar ataxia on a daily basis.