The Italian version of the Childhood Health Assessment Questionnaire (CHAQ) and the Child Health Questionnaire (CHQ)

We report herein the results of the cross-cultural adaptation and validatio n into the Italian language of the parent's version of two health related q uality of life instruments. The Childhood Health Assessment Questionnaire ( CHAQ) is a disease specific health instrument that measures functional abil ity in daily living activities in children with juvenile idiopathic arthrit is (KA). The Child Health Questionnaire (CHQ) is a generic health instrumen t designed to capture the physical and psychosocial well-being of children independently from the underlying disease. The Italian CHAQ was already pub lished in the literature and was therefore revalidated while the Italian CH Q was full), cross culturally adapted with 3 forward and 3 backward transla tions, and than validated. A total of 1,192 subjects were enrolled: 404 pat ients with JIA (16% systemic onset, 31% polyarticular onset, 21% extended o ligoarticular subtype, and 32% persistent oligoarticular subtype) and 788 h ealthy children. The CHAQ clinically discriminated between healthy subjects and JIA patients, with the systemic, polyarticular and extended oligoartic ular subtypes having a higher degree of disability pain, and a lower overal l well-being when compared to their healthy, peers. Also the CHQ clinically discriminated between healthy subjects and JIA patients, with the systemic onset, polyarticular onset and extended oligoarticular subtypes having a l ower physical and psychosocial well-being when compared to their healthy pe ers. In conclusion the Italian version of the CHAQ-CHQ are reliable, and valid t ools for the functional, physical and psychosocial assessment of children w ith JIA.