title: Reliability and validity of the obstructive sleep apnea-18 survey in healthy children and children with syndromic craniosynostosis.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) affects a person's quality of life. A questionnaire, the OSA-18, is available to measure quality of life in children with OSA not caused by specific craniofacial syndromes. We assessed the internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and discriminative validity of the OSA-18 in children with syndromic and complex craniosynostosis; we also applied the OSA-18 in healthy children to obtain reference values.
  
  
  METHODS
  The OSA-18 was translated in the Dutch language using the procedure of multiple forward and backward translations. Test-retest reliability and internal consistency were examined. In a prospective study, the craniosynostosis patients underwent an ambulatory polysomnography to diagnose OSA. The ability of the OSA-18 to discriminate between subgroups of patients with or without OSA was evaluated. We compared OSA-18 scores of children with syndromic or complex craniosynostosis with scores in healthy children.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The Cronbach's alpha was ≥ 0.70 for the total OSA-18 score and for most of the domains in both the craniosynostosis and general population. In the craniosynostosis group, the test-retest intraclass correlation coefficients were ≥ 0.70, except for the domain physical suffering at 0.69. The discriminative validity of the domains sleep disturbance, physical suffering, caregiver concerns, and total OSA-18 score was significant between the general and craniosynostosis population.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study supports the reliability and validity of the OSA-18 in children with syndromic or complex craniosynostosis.
authors.affiliation: Dutch Craniofacial Center, Erasmus Medical Center-Sophia Children's Hospital, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. n.bannink@erasmusmc.nl
authors.forename: Natalja
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Bannink
authors.forename: Marianne
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Maliepaard
authors.forename: Hein
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Raat
authors.forename: Koen F M
authors.initials: KF
authors.lastname: Joosten
authors.forename: Irene M J
authors.initials: IM
authors.lastname: Mathijssen
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D015897:Comorbidity; D003398:Craniosynostoses / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D017286:Polysomnography; D011446:Prospective Studies; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D020181:Sleep Apnea, Obstructive / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards