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Objective: The aim of this study was to adapt the student version of the Jefferson Scale of Physician Empathy (JSPE) to Turkish medical students in order to assess its reliability and validity, and to analyze the gender and year differences. Materials and Methods: The student version of the JSPE was translated into Turkish using back-translation procedures, and was administered to 752 medical school students from the first to fifth years of study. To assess the dimensionality of the scale, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) for categorical data was carried out. Internal consistency was assessed by Cronbach's alpha. Subscale scores were compared in terms of gender and year. Results: The three-dimensional structure of the JSPE was confirmed by CFA except item 18. The internal consistencies of the subscales were 0.83, 0.70 and 0.60, respectively. There were statistically significant gender and medical school year differences in terms of "perspective taking" and "compassionate care" scores. Conclusion: The student version of JSPE was successfully adapted, and the adapted scale can be used in Turkey. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: In this study, we investigated the psychometric properties of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) core set for low back pain (LBP). Patients and methods: One-hundred outpatients with LBP (73 females, 27 males; mean age 55.3 years; range 24 to 84 years) were assessed by the ICF core set for LBP. The patients also completed the Roland-Morris disability questionnaire (RMDQ) and Short Form-36 (SF-36) questionnaire. The internal construct validity of the ICF core set for LBP was assessed by Rasch analysis and external construct validity by correlations with the RMDQ and SF-36 Health Survey version 1.0. Reliability was tested by internal consistency and person separation index. Results: After rescoring the disordered response categories and deletion of some items, "body functions and body structures" and "activities and participation" item sets satistifed Rasch model expectations with a mean item fit of 0.005 (SD 0.619) and -0.006 (SD 0.730), and person fit of -0.165 (SD 0.561) and -0.084 (SD 0.806) respectively. Both item sets were unidimensional and showed no differential item functioning. Their reliabilities were good with Cronbach's alpha coefficient and person separation index levels above 0.77. Although the mean functionality level of the patients was lower than the mean difficulty level of the items, the distribution of the difficulty level of the items overlapped with the distribution of the functionality level of the patients for both item sets. The presence of the expected level of correlations between both item sets and RMDQ and SF-36 has confirmed the external construct validity. "Environmental factors" did not meet the assumptions of the Rasch analysis. Conclusion: After some modifications, a 15-item "body functions and body structures" set and a 21-item "activities and participation" set from the ICF comprehensive core set were found to be reliable and valid to assess functioning in patients with LBP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To adapt the London Handicap Scale into the Turkish language, and to investigate the scaling properties of this version in a sample of people who have experienced a stroke.Design: After the translation process, the internal construct validity was tested by Rasch analysis and the reliability by internal consistency and intraclass correlation coefficient. The interval scaling properties were assessed by contrasting the raw and weighted London Handicap Scale scores with the Rasch latent estimates. Setting: An outpatient rehabilitation unit of a university hospital.Subjects: One hundred and eighty-eight community-dwelling post-stroke patients (mean age 63 (SD 12) years, 54% male) were assessed by the Turkish version of the London Handicap Scale.Results: After adjustment for local dependency, the data showed good fit to Rasch model expectations with a mean item fit -0.240 (SD 1.868), person fit -0.403 (SD 0.893) and chi-square interaction 8.55 (df 10, P =0.575). The reliability was good with a Cronbach’s α and intraclass correlation coefficient of 0.845. Analysis of the scaling properties showed that either the raw London Handicap Scale score or its weighted score were non-linear with respect to the Rasch latent estimate.Conclusions: The London Handicap Scale is a valid and reliable scale for use in stroke in Turkey. Its unweighted raw scores and weighted scores are equivalent and ordinal, but a linear transformation is possible through Rasch analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]