Al. Quittner et al., Translation and linguistic validation of a disease-specific quality of life measure for cystic fibrosis, J PED PSYCH, 25(6), 2000, pp. 403-414
Objective: To develop a conceptually and semantically valid English version
of a French disease-specific measure of quality of life for children, adol
escents, and adults with cystic fibrosis (CF).
Methods: Following a backward and forward translation of the measure, 60 pa
rticipants, including 20 children, 20 parents, and 20 adolescents/young adu
lts completed the Cystic Fibrosis Questionnaire (CFQ) and a series of cogni
tive probes evaluating their understanding of the items and response choice
s.
Results: Semantic and conceptual problems with the items were identified an
d modified for the second set of cognitive interviews. Response distributio
ns across items and ages were adequate, and the predicted associations betw
een disease severity and quality of life were obtained.
Conclusions: The English version of the CFQ appears to be a linguistically
valid measure of quality of life for patients with CF. A national validatio
n study is now under way to test the psychometric properties of the measure
.