Translation and validation into Portuguese of the international spinal cord injury pulmonary function basic data set

Spinal cord injury (SCI) is a serious disabling syndrome, and the clinical picture depends on the level and extent of the injury. The International Spinal Cord Society (ISCoS) and the American Spinal Cord Association (ASIA) have developed instruments (Data Sets) to assess the various aspects of the SCI. In 2012, the International SCI Pulmonary Function Basic Data Set was elaborated. It is composed of four questions and spirometry for the collection of lung function basic data.

The objective was to translate and validate the International SCI Pulmonary Function Basic Data Set to the Portuguese language.

The entire methodology followed the recommendations of the ISCoS and ASIA. Two translations of the original version into Portuguese were performed, and after consensus among the translators, the Portuguese version was sent for back-translation. After back-translation and comparison with the original version, the final Portuguese version was obtained. For the second phase of the study, 30 SCI individuals were selected. Two interviewers applied the questionnaire in two distinct moments.

All results presented constant, excellent, or perfectly concordant data, except for the third question in the inter-rater comparison, where the Kappa coefficient showed value reasonable in the first interview and good in the second.

The translation into Brazilian Portuguese of the "International SCI Pulmonary Function Basic Data Set" created a valid and highly reliable instrument, like the original without linguistic and cultural disagreements that allow its use in the evaluation of patients with SCI in Brazil.