Turkish translation, cross-cultural adaptation, and psychometric validation of the pregnancy symptoms inventory: An instrument to assess the full spectrum of pregnancy symptoms

Abstract

Objective: To translate the PSI (Pregnancy Symptoms Inventory) into Turkish, to perform its cultural adaptation, to establish its reliability and validity, and to examine the prevalence of perceived pregnancy symptoms frequency and symptom-related limitation in Turkish pregnant women. Design: This cross-sectional study included healthy pregnant women over 18 years old from all 3 pregnancy trimesters. In the reliability analysis, the test-retest reliability was investigated by the Pearson correlation analysis. For the criterion validity of the PSI, correlations between the total pregnancy symptom frequency scores and the total scores of the Tilburg Pregnancy Distress Scale, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, the Beck Depression Inventory, and the Nottingham Health Profile were analyzed. Frequency and limitation perception prevalence of the symptoms were calculated as a percentage based on the response to each symptom. Statistical significance level was accepted as p<0.05. Measurements and Findings: In the present study, 210 pregnant women participated, and 42 pregnant women filled out the Turkish-PSI twice for the test-retest analysis. In the frequency and limitation sections of the PSI, the test-retest correlations for each symptom were found to vary between medium and very strong (0.42–1.00 and 0.39–1.00, p <0.05, respectively). Moderate correlations (rho = 0.39–0.58, p <0.05, p ≤ 0.001) were detected between the frequency section total score and the total scores of the other scales. The top four symptoms indicated as “often” by the Turkish pregnant women were urinary frequency (42.4%), fatigue/tiredness (28.6%), increased vaginal discharge (26.7%), and upper/lower back pain (23.8%). Key conclusions: The Turkish-PSI is a comprehensive, reliable, and valid inventory for evaluating a wide range of pregnancy symptoms in Turkish pregnant women. Further studies are needed to examine the sensitivity of the Turkish-PSI to treatment-induced changes. Implications for practice: Comprehensive and practical symptom questioning tools such as the PSI during pregnancy can lead to the early detection of pregnancy symptoms and to initiate effective non-pharmacological interventions.