Validation of an instrument to measure health-related quality of life in Chilean children and adolescents

Background: KIDSCREEN-52 is an instrument to assess health related quality of life in children and adolescents. Aim: To culturally adapt and validate the KIDSCREEN-52 questionnaire in Chileans. Material and Methods: Two independent translations from the English Spanish language were conciliated and retranslated to English. The conciliated version was tested during a cognitive interview to adolescents of different socioeconomic levels. The final version was validated in 7,910 school attending adolescents. Results: In the cross-cultural adaptation, 50 of the 52 items presented low or medium levels of difficulty and a high semantic equivalence. Distribution according to gender, grades and types of schools was similar to the sample. Single ages were not affected by sex distribution. The Confirmatory Factor Analyses were: chi(2) (1229) = 20996.7, Root Mean Square Error of Approximation =.045 and Comparative Fit Index =.96. The instrument had a Cronbach's alpha of .93. The domains had scores over 0.70 points, with the exception of the Self-perception domain, with a score of 0.62. Conclusions: The Chilean version of KIDSCREEN-52 is culturally appropriate and semantically equivalent in its English and Spanish versions (from Spain). Its reliability and validity were adequate.