Development of the Nasal Obstruction Disability Index (NODI)

The aim of this study was to develop a new scale that assesses the subjective severity of nasal obstruction from functional and psychosocial perspectives, independent of etiology.

A 27-question prototype scale evaluating nasal obstruction from a functional and psychosocial perspective was created by three expert otolaryngologists. This scale was applied to 203 patients who presented to our clinic with nasal obstruction and to a control group consisting of 135 people without nasal obstruction, and the significance of the scale was tested. Validity, reliability, and factor analyses were performed on the prototype scale, the number of questions and subgroups were determined, and the final version of the scale was created. The final version of the scale was reanalyzed for reliability and administered twice at 3-week intervals to 125 patients with nasal obstruction who were scheduled for septoplasty in our clinic.

The scale consisted of 20 items in total and four factors: "functional problems," "sleep problems," "social problems," and "emotional problems." Reliability analysis showed that the Cronbach's alpha coefficient of the scale was 0.91. In the item analyses, item-total and item-remainder correlations were significant (p < 0.001), and discriminant analysis showed that all item and factor scores were discriminative. Analyses performed to determine the test-retest reliability showed that all items and factor scores were significant (p < 0.001).

The Nasal Obstruction Disability Index has good internal consistency, validity, and excellent reproducibility for assessing the subjective severity of nasal obstruction.