Evaluating the Psychometric Properties of the Kannada Version of EAT 10

Eating Assessment Tool 10 is a symptom survey and has several advantages over other existing questionnaires. The instrument has also proven to be useful in establishing initial dysphagia symptom severity and to aid in measuring treatment outcomes. Due to its wide applicability, the instrument has been translated into several languages. The aim of the present study was to translate and validate the Kannada version of Eating Assessment Tool 10.

88 individuals with dysphagia and equal number of healthy individuals filled the Kannada version of Eating Assessment Tool. Internal consistency and test-retest reproducibility were used for reliability testing. Validity was also established by comparing the scores of dysphagia patients and healthy controls.

The overall Cronbach's α for the tool was 0.9 indicating a good internal consistency. The internal consistency of each of the items was also high, and ranged 0.88 to 0.9. Twenty patients filled the questionnaire after a span of 48 h, and the ICC coefficient was found to be 0.89 indicating a high reliability. The control group has significantly lower scores for all scales when compared to the dysphagia group [t(174) = 78.41, p < 0.001].

The present study demonstrates that the Kannada version of EAT 10 has good internal consistency, test retest reliability, and concurrent validity. The results of the study also reveal that it is a reliable and valid tool for screening dysphagia population.