Reliability and construct validity of the oral mucositis daily questionnaire in children with cancer.

BACKGROUND

The objective of this study was to examine the test-retest reliability and construct validity of parent-reported Oral Mucositis Daily Questionnaire (OMDQ) in children receiving intensive chemotherapy.

METHODS

Parents of children with cancer receiving intensive chemotherapy for leukaemia/lymphoma or undergoing stem cell transplantation (SCT) were asked to complete OMDQ daily for 21 d after chemotherapy. Other measures of mucositis obtained concurrently with OMDQ included the World Health Organization (WHO) Mucositis Scale, pain Visual Analogue Scale (VAS) and the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy Esophageal Cancer Sub-scale (FACT-ECS).

RESULTS

Parents of 59 children (median age = 5.62) provided complete OMDQ data for inclusion in analysis. The majority of children (73%) received SCT. Test-retest reliability of OMDQ exceeded the expected moderate reliability threshold established a priori and in particular, was good to excellent when mucositis was expected. In general, items of OMDQ that relate to pain, swallowing, drinking, eating and talking demonstrated moderate correlations with WHO, VAS and FACT-ECS indices with correlation coefficients ≥ 0.5.

CONCLUSIONS

Parent-report of a modified version of OMDQ is reliable and the questions relating to mouth and throat pain, as well as effect on function display construct validity for this population of children receiving intensive chemotherapy.