OBJECTIVES: The Living with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (LCOPD) scale is a disease-specific measure used to assess quality of life of people with COPD. The measure was developed in parallel in the UK and US and was shown to be highly acceptable to patients, unidimensional and have very good psychometric properties. The objective of this study was to adapt and validate the LCOPD for use in Italy, Spain and Russia.
METHODS: Translated versions were produced using dual panel methodology. The translated versions were tested with patients to ensure face and content validity. Test-retest postal surveys were conducted to establish internal consistency, reproducibility and construct validity.
RESULTS: The translation process proved successful for the new language versions. Cognitive debriefing interviews conducted in Italy (n15), Spain (n14) and Russia (n8) indicated that patients found the new versions of the LCOPD acceptable and easy to comprehend. Validation data was generated from postal surveys in Italy (n51), Spain (n142) and Russia (n69). All three versions showed good internal consistency ranging from 0.94-0.95, and good reproducibility was evident from the high test-retest correlation scores (Italian0.96, Russian0.94, Spanish0.85). The Russian LCOPD had strong correlations with a measure of fatigue (CAFS; 0.87) and sleep (CASIS; 0.76). The Spanish LCOPD had a moderate correlation with the CAFS (0.66) and a strong correlation with the CASIS (0.75). The Italian LCOPD had strong correlations with three of the sub-scales of the Nottingham Health Profile (0.83) and with the NHP-D (0.86). The new adaptations of the LCOPD were all able to distinguish between patients based on their self-rated general health and COPD severity.
CONCLUSIONS: The LCOPD was successfully adapted for use in Italy, Spain and Russia. These results were similar to those found for the original UK and US versions.
