The structural properties of the European Brain Injury Questionnaire.
OBJECTIVE
We sought to examine the reliability and validity of the European Brain Injury Questionnaire as an evaluation tool in a stroke population by applying the Rasch methodology.


METHODS
The European Brain Injury Questionnaire was distributed to 54 patients with stroke and 36 next of kin at discharge from the rehabilitation ward and at a 1-year follow-up. Rasch analysis was used for evaluating the psychometric characteristic and the quality of the measures produced with focus on reliability and validity. The reliability was determined by the separation. The construct validity was determined by examining the hierarchy of the tasks and by evaluating the fit of individual tasks to the latent construct. Analyses of differences across occasions, and across patients and next of kin, were made to examine the stability of the instrument.


RESULTS
The reliability was good as the instrument met the criteria for separation. Two items at discharge and 5 items at 1-year follow-up were misfits. If not more than 5% of the items fail to fit the Rasch model the instrument can be considered unidimensional, which in this case only concerned the 1-year follow-up. The instrument was stable over time and across patients and next of kin.


CONCLUSIONS
With some alterations the European Brain Injury Questionnaire seems to be a useful instrument in clinical practice and research, and a help to capture the social, emotional, and cognitive impacts of a stroke.
Björkdahl
Ann
A
Institute of Clinical Neuroscience-Rehabilitation Medicine, Göteborg University, Göteborg, Sweden. ann.bjorkdahl@rehab.gu.se
Nilsson
Asa Lundgren
AL
Sunnerhagen
Katharina Stibrant
KS