Validity and reliability of the oral assessment guide in children and young people treated with chemotherapy

Objective: This methodological study aims to adapt The Oral Assessment Guide in Children and Young People into Turkish and assess its validity and reliability. Method: The target population of the study was all the children undergoing chemotherapy and between 8-18 years of age, who attended the Department of Pediatric Oncology and Hematology Clinic of Akdeniz University between September 2014 and July 2015. The study sample consisted of children between 8-18 years of age with cancer, who have received chemotherapy once. They able to express themselves and agreed to participate in the study. All data were collected by authors during face-to-face interviews with Informed Consent Form, Personal Information Form, The Oral Assessment Guide in Children and Young People (The GOSH OAG) and Children's International Mucositis Evaluation Scale (ChIMES). Results: The linguistic adaptation and validation of the scale was conducted by using a translation and back-translation technique. The internal consistency and parallel form methods were used to determine the reliability of the Turkish version of scale. Cronbach's alpha coefficients of the inventory were found 0.83. Positive correlations were observed between the variables. In parallel forms reliability, the correlations between The GOSH OAG and ChIMES were found to be pozitive, moderate and statistically significant (r=0.295, p=0.022). Content and concurrent validity were used to determine the validity. The expert judgments showed that the correlation between the items on the scale was fairly good (I-CVI and S-CVI 0.91). The concurrent validity was determined by item analysis based on differences between averages of upper-lower group item scores. When the mean scores of items of the upper and lower groups of the inventory were examined, the differences between groups were found statistically significant. The correlations between inventory items were significantly higher (p<0.05, p<0.01). Conclusion: The measurements conducted on the Turkish version of scale showed that it is consistent with the original scale, valid and reliable for Turkish society. It was concluded that the adapted Turkish version of scale can be used in children undergoing chemotherapy in Turkish society and it can effectively evaluate both inside and around the mouth of these children. Key words: oral mucositis, chemotherapy, oral assessment, child, reliability and validity