Validity and Reliability Study of the Turkish Version of the Subjective Handicap of Epilepsy

Abstract

Objective: This study aimed to investigate the validity and reliability of the Turkish version of “The Subjective Handicap of Epilepsy (SHE)” questionnaire. Methods: Upon the permission from the authors of the questionnaire, the English questionnaire was separately translated into Turkish by two neurologists who had a native language of Turkish and who had a valid certificate for English. A single translation was created by combining these two translations by another neurologist specialized in epilepsy. Afterwards, the Turkish translation was translated back to English by two other neurologists, blind to the original questionnaire. Internal consistency of the test was measured by using the Cohen’s kappa coefficients. The questionnaire was interpreted in 20 patients and was repeated after 15 days. After the intraclass consistency coefficient between the two evaluations was determined to be positive, it was applied to a total of 252 patients during the study period. Results: A total of 252 patients (146 women- 57.9%, 106 men- 42.1%) with a mean age of 33.4+11.5 years were included in the study. The mean age of epilepsy onset was 19.0+10.9 years, and the mean disease duration was 14.4+11.2 years. The internal consistency of the scale was found to be highly consistent with Cohen’s kappa value of 0.864. The intraclass correlation coefficient value for the test-retest reliability was found to be excellent, with a value of 0.945 for the whole questionnaire (p<0.001). Conclusion: We observed that the Turkish version of the SHE is a valid and reliable assessment for determining disability in epilepsy patients.

Keywords

• epilepsy
• disability
• validity
• reliability
• handicap