Transcultural adaptation of the Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Depression Inventory to Brazilian Portuguese

Abstract

Address correspondence to: Tatiana Lins Carvalho. Rua Antonio de Castro, 150, ap. 601, Casa Amarela – 52070-080 – Recife, PE, Brazil. E-mail: tatiana.lcarvalho@gmail.com Dear Editor Depression symptoms in patients with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) has been investigated using instruments not specific and may interfere in results1-3. Given the evolution and physical impairment caused by ALS, the ALS Depression Inventory (ADI) was created in 2005 to assess depression symptoms in these individuals. Results have shown a reduction in 12 items also providing accurate measures of depression symptoms in severely paralyzed patients4,5. In light of the instrument’s accuracy in detecting depression symptoms at any stage of ALS, and since it has yet to be used in Brazil, it was necessary to translate and transculturally adapt the ADI-12 to Brazilian Portuguese. There are formal stages for translating and adapting instruments. Attention to linguistics must be given during translation, due to the different semantics between languages. The method proposed by Beaton et al.6 was used as a model. The pre-final version was applied to 15 patients diagnosed with ALS in accordance with El Escorial-R at the Neuromuscular Disease Outpatient Clinic of Oswaldo Cruz University Hospital (HUOC) of University of Pernambuco (UPE). Participants were questioned to determine whether the responses actually corresponded to what the individuals understood and if changes needed to be made to the document. All subjects were aged 18 years and older, of both sexes and gave their informed consent. The study was conducted between December 2013 and November 2014, after approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Committee of University of Pernambuco/PROPEGE (CAAE: 25749413.2.0000.5207). Table 1 shows the results of the versions of the ADI-12 according to the stages of transcultural adaptation. A number of subtle changes were made to conform with Brazilian Portuguese. For example the term “consists of ” is translated as “consta de”, but we preferred to translate it as “consiste em”, more commonly used in our language and therefore easier for the subjects to understand.