Evaluating score distributions in the revised Dutch version of the Childhood Health Assessment Questionnaire.
OBJECTIVE
Evaluating the original, and the revised version of the Dutch Childhood Health Assessment Questionnaire (CHAQ). To explore the effect of different score calculation methods and eight more challenging items as proposed by Lam et al. (2004) on the score distribution in a population of patients with Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis (JIA).


METHODS
Two convenience samples of 59 and 31 children with JIA were studied. Box-and-whisker plots and the Kolmogorov-Smirnov (K-S) one-sample test of normality were used, to explore the score distributions.


RESULTS
The results of this study confirm a ceiling effect when using the original CHAQ-30 with either score calculation method. The original CHAQ with the added eight more challenging items and the "mean" score calculation method, as well as the revised CHAQ showed less ceiling effect.


CONCLUSIONS
The original CHAQ-38 with the "mean" score calculation method as well as the revised CHAQ are a possible alternative for future studies. However, there is a need for further prospective studies to improve the CHAQ and to support our findings.
Ouwerkerk
Jessika W
JW
Department of Pediatric Physical Therapy & Exercise Physiology, Wilhelmina Children's Hospital, University Medical Center Utrecht, Utrecht, The Netherlands. j.vandernet@umcutrecht.nl.
van Pelt
Philomine A
PA
Takken
Tim
T
Helders
Paul Jm
PJ
Net
Janjaap van der
Jv
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