Barnhöft: a hip specific 6-item questionnaire for children

Area of Science:

• Paediatric Orthopaedics
• Health Outcomes Research
• Quality of Life Measurement

Background:

• Health-related quality of life (HRQoL) assessment is crucial in pediatric orthopaedics.
• Disease-specific instruments enhance outcome evaluation for hip disorders.
• A need existed for a culturally adapted hip function and pain instrument for Swedish children.

Purpose of the Study:

• To translate and culturally adapt the CHOHES questionnaire for Swedish children (8-15 years).
• To validate the adapted instrument, named Barnhöft, for assessing hip function and pain.
• To ensure Barnhöft's comprehensibility and clinical relevance in the target population.

Main Methods:

• Translation and cultural adaptation of the CHOHES questionnaire into Barnhöft.
• Cognitive debriefing interviews with 15 healthy children for comprehensibility.
• Test-retest reliability and construct validity testing in children with slipped capital femoral epiphysis (n=25) and healthy controls (n=35), compared with EQ-5D-Y.

Main Results:

• Barnhöft demonstrated good test-retest stability, indicating reliable measurements.
• Strong construct validity was found, with significant correlations between Barnhöft and EQ-5D-Y for pain (Spearman's rho=0.73) and functional limitations (Spearman's rho=0.67).
• The expert committee confirmed the content validity of the Barnhöft questionnaire.

Conclusions:

• Barnhöft is a simple, 6-item questionnaire suitable for identifying children with hip pain.
• The instrument effectively assesses functional limitations resulting from childhood hip disease sequelae.
• Barnhöft can be a valuable tool for evaluating outcomes in pediatric hip disorders.