Glasgow Coma Scale Score - Is It Reproducible?

Use of the Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) as a quantitative measurement to document level of responsiveness in patients is ubiquitous, but the reproducibility of the score in the emergency department has not previously been studied. Investigators at a Level 1 trauma center evaluated interrater reliability of the GCS score in the assessment of a convenience sample of 131 adult ED patients who presented with altered levels of consciousness.

For each patient, 2 of 19 attending emergency physicians individually assessed and documented the overall GCS score and its components (motor activity, verbal activity, eye opening) within 5 minutes of each other. Each EP was blinded to the other's scores. Fifteen patients were excluded from the study because of …