Quality of life and aphasia. Multicentric standardization of a questionnaire.
OBJECTIVE
It is important to assess aphasics' quality of life in order to plan a rehabilitation treatment. To date such a tool is still missing for Italian patients. This paper reports normative data of the Italian version of SAQOL-39, a British questionnaire aimed to assess aphasics' quality of life. It consists of 39 items, divided into 4 subdomains (Physical, Communication, Psychosocial and Energy).


METHODS
Forty-two patients coming from 3 different Speech Therapy Services were enrolled. All patients completed speech therapy before examination. They were submitted to the Italian SAQOL-39 and 2 screening tests for aphasia: 1) Communication Assessment Scale according Goodglass and Kaplan; 2) Franchay Aphasia Screening Test (FAST). A receptive FAST score of 7 out of 15 was used as a cut-off score for SAQOL-39 administration.


RESULTS
The Italian SAQOL-39 showed good internal consistency (full scale Cronbach's alpha 0.939). Cronbach's alpha for every subdomains ranged from 0.950 (Communication) to 0.720 (Energy). Fluent aphasics gave significantly higher scores than nonfluent ones on full scale, and all out of Energy subdomains. Furthermore gravity of aphasia correlated with both full scale and Communication subdomain scores.


CONCLUSIONS
In authors' opinion, the Italian SAQOL-39 shares many psychometric features with the English one. This questionnaire seems to be suitable for clinical practice.
Posteraro
L
L
Neuromotor Rehabilitation Unit, PRM Bozzolo, Mantova Hospitals, Via 25 Aprile 71, 46012 Bozzolo, Mantova, Italy. lucio.posteraro@ospedalimantova.it
Formis
A
A
Grassi
E
E
Bighi
M
M
Nati
P
P
Proietti Bocchini
C
C
Todeschini
E
E
Bidini
C
C
Corsini
D
D
Agosti
M
M
Franceschini
M
M
D000368:Aged; D001037:Aphasia / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000534:rehabilitation*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011594:Psychometrics; D011788:Quality of Life; D012044:Regression Analysis; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards*; D016896:Treatment Outcome