Transcultural adaptation of the clinical Food and Nutrition Screening Tool for children and adolescents with cerebral palsy

Abstract

Abstract: 

Introduction: A screening tool was recently published in English to detect feeding/swallowing difficulties and malnutrition in children with cerebral palsy (CP) aimed at their caregivers. An adaptation of the tool for Argentina is not available.

Aim: To cross-culturally adapt the Feeding and Nutrition Screening Tool (Bell et. al., 2019) for children aged 2-19 years with CP that is culturally appropriate to the Argentine population, and that is semantically and metrically equivalent to the original Australian version.

Methods: cross-sectional study. The transcultural adaptation included the translation of the tool into Spanish (Argentine) language by two translators, subsequent there was an equivalence consensus by two experts, back translation and review by two of the original authors. A pretest with cognitive interviews was carried out with a sample of 10 caregivers of children with CP between 2 and 19 years old from Argentina. Heterogeneity was sought in the sample group of interviewees. For data analysis, tables developed by the Australian group for the adaptation of these instruments were used. Each table had a checklist to evaluate each of the stages, assessing the equivalence of concepts (cultural), meanings (semantic) and comprehension through suggestions.

Results: In the translation stage, changes were made at the time of back-translation and revision of the Australian authors. Semantic and cultural equivalence conflicts were detected in five items that were corrected (e.g., ¨major problems¨ translated as “problema grave” was changed to ¨serios problemas¨).

The pretest stage was composed of 10 relatives of children with CP, 90% of whom were female. Regarding their children with CP, 70% had severe motor impairment, and 30% had mild-moderate impairment. In these cognitive interviews, cultural equivalence and comprehension problems arose, which required the modification of five items (e.g., changing "I don't know" to "I am not sure"). The final version was approved by the original authors.

Conclusion: A transcultural adapted Food and Nutrition Screening Tool for Children with CP was constructed for Argentina. This tool is in the process of validation.