title: Internal consistency of a Brazilian version of the unified Huntington's disease rating scale.
abstract: We evaluated the reliability of a translated Brazilian version of the Unified Huntington's Disease Rating Scale (UHDRS) to establish the reproducibility of the scale in a population that differs substantially from that on which the scale was originally validated. After a training period with the video and guidelines requested from the Huntington Study Group, we applied the UHDRS, except for the cognitive tests, to a group of 21 Brazilian patients with a molecular diagnosis of Huntington's disease (HD). We found a high degree of internal consistency of the motor section of the UHDRS (Cronbach's alpha= 0.841). There was a negative correlation between the total motor score and the functional assessment, the independence scale and the functional capacity. There was a positive correlation between these 3 scales of functional evaluation and a negative correlation between the age of onset of the disease and the number of CAG repeats. The behavioral scale and disease duration were not correlated with any factor. The clinical characteristics of this sample of patients as described by the UHDRS were roughly similar to those reported in the original validation studies and the correlations described were similar to those reported previously. We conclude that the Brazilian version of the UHDRS is reliable and valid to study patients with HD in the Brazilian setting, that this sample of Brazilian patients had clinical characteristics similar to those observed in other world regions, as expected, and that the clinical training method used for the application of the UHDRS was effective to insure a high degree of clinical reproducibility.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Psychiatry and Medical Psychology, Ribeirão Preto School of Medicine, University of São Paulo, Ribeirão Preto, SP, Brazil. tumasv@rnp.fmrp.usp.br
authors.forename: Vitor
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Tumas
authors.forename: Sarah Teixeira
authors.initials: ST
authors.lastname: Camargos
authors.forename: Paulo Samandar
authors.initials: PS
authors.lastname: Jalali
authors.forename: Adriano de Paula
authors.initials: Ade P
authors.lastname: Galesso
authors.forename: Wilson
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Marques
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001938:Brazil; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D006816:Huntington Disease / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics; D008297:Male; D008609:Mental Status Schedule / Q000592:standards; D008875:Middle Aged; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000145:classification / Q000502:physiology*; D009460:Neurologic Examination / Q000592:standards*; D010641:Phenotype; D011596:Psychomotor Disorders / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000235:genetics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results