The development of a handicap assessment questionnaire: the Impact on Participation and Autonomy (IPA).
OBJECTIVE
To report on the feasibility and psychometric properties in terms of homogeneity and construct validity of a newly developed handicap questionnaire focusing on person-perceived handicaps: the Impact on Participation and Autonomy (IPA).


METHODS
Cross-sectional. SETTING, subjects and outcome measure: One hundred consecutive individuals from the outpatient clinic of the department of rehabilitation of an academic hospital administered the new questionnaire IPA.


RESULTS
The results show good homogeneity and construct validity of the IPA. Factor analysis showed that the scale consists of four factors, explaining 68% of the total variance: social relationships, autonomy in self-care, mobility and leisure, and family role. Homogeneity of the four subscales was considered good, Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.84 (family role) to 0.87 (social relationships). Feasibility in terms of the number of missing values and administration time needed was satisfactory.


CONCLUSIONS
The first results suggest that the IPA promises to be a useful handicap questionnaire. Further research is needed to establish test-retest reliability, convergent validity and responsiveness to change.
Cardol
M
M
Department of Rehabilitation, Academic Medical Center, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands. m.cardol@amc.uva.nl
de Haan
R J
RJ
van den Bos
G A
GA
de Jong
B A
BA
de Groot
I J
IJ
D000203:Activities of Daily Living; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D002908:Chronic Disease; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004185:Disability Evaluation; D006233:Persons with Disabilities / Q000145:classification*; D005240:Feasibility Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012648:Self Care; D012649:Self Concept; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards