Development of adolescent childhood cancer survivors' psychosocial issues scale

Follow-up care for adolescent childhood cancer survivors (ACCS) after they return to school requires an understanding of their psychosocial issues. Therefore, this study developed the adolescent childhood cancer survivors' psychosocial issues scale (ACCSPIS) and evaluated its reliability and validity.

In the development phase, pediatric oncology clinical professionals created the 24 item questionnaire of ACCS's psychosocial issues. In the feasibility phase, a survey was administered to 165 ACCS aged 12-18 years after discharge from hospital in Japan, and 57 completed questionnaires were analyzed. The survey items were psychosocial issues, attributes, K6 scale, and impact of event scale-revised (IES-R) scale. Factor analysis was conducted for psychosocial issues. Regarding reliability, Cronbach's α coefficients and item-total correlation coefficients were calculated. Regarding validity, Spearman's rank correlation coefficients between ACCSPIS and K6 and IES-R were calculated, and confirmatory factor analysis was conducted.

Four factors comprising 15 items were extracted: "appearance changes due to treatment effects," "anxiety about marriage and the future," "change in appearance due to treatment", and "psychological distress due to interpersonal relationships and information about the disease." The model fit was good, with a total ACCSPIS α coefficient of 0.901 and α coefficients for the subscales ranging from 0.651 to 0.914. The K6 and IES-R were significantly associated with the total ACCSPIS, and item-total correlations were satisfactory.

The reliability and validity of ACCSPIS were generally confirmed. This scale could be useful to measure psychosocial issues in ACCS aged 12-18 years after their return to school.