1. Validation of the COVID-19 Fears Questionnaires for Chronic Medical Conditions: A Scleroderma Patient-centered Intervention Network COVID-19 Cohort study
- Author
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Yin Wu, Linda Kwakkenbos, Richard S. Henry, Lydia Tao, Sami Harb, Angelica Bourgeault, Marie-Eve Carrier, Brooke Levis, Ying Sun, Parash Mani Bhandari, Andrea Carboni-Jiménez, Maria Gagarine, Chen He, Ankur Krishnan, Zelalem F. Negeri, Dipika Neupane, Luc Mouthon, Susan J. Bartlett, Andrea Benedetti, Brett D. Thombs, Nicole Culos-Reed, Ghassan El-Baalbaki, Shannon Hebblethwaite, Scott Patten, John Varga, Laura Bustamante, Delaney Duchek, Kelsey Ellis, Danielle Rice, Laura Dyas, Catherine Fortuné, Amy Gietzen, Geneviève Guillot, Nancy Lewis, Karen Nielsen, Michelle Richard, Maureen Sauvé, and Joep Welling
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,Psychometrics ,Article ,Scleroderma ,Experimental Psychopathology and Treatment ,Cohort Studies ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Cronbach's alpha ,Patient-Centered Care ,Surveys and Questionnaires ,Validation ,Medicine ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,Pandemics ,Aged ,Scleroderma, Systemic ,Item analysis ,business.industry ,Construct validity ,Reproducibility of Results ,COVID-19 ,Fear ,Middle Aged ,Confirmatory factor analysis ,Exploratory factor analysis ,3. Good health ,Coronavirus ,Psychiatry and Mental health ,Clinical Psychology ,Cross-Sectional Studies ,Convergent validity ,Chronic Disease ,Systemic sclerosis ,Female ,Chronic medical condition ,Mental health ,business ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery ,Cohort study ,Clinical psychology - Abstract
Objective Fear associated with medical vulnerability should be considered when assessing mental health among individuals with chronic medical conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic. The objective was to develop and validate the COVID-19 Fears Questionnaire for Chronic Medical Conditions. Methods Fifteen initial items were generated based on suggestions from 121 people with the chronic autoimmune disease systemic sclerosis (SSc; scleroderma). Patients in a COVID-19 SSc cohort completed items between April 9 and 27, 2020. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and item analysis were used to select items for inclusion. Cronbach's alpha and Pearson correlations were used to evaluate internal consistency reliability and convergent validity. Factor structure was confirmed with confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in follow-up data collection two weeks later. Results 787 participants completed baseline measures; 563 of them completed the follow-up assessment. Ten of 15 initial items were included in the final questionnaire. EFA suggested that a single dimension explained the data reasonably well. There were no indications of floor or ceiling effects. Cronbach's alpha was 0.91. Correlations between the COVID-19 Fears Questionnaire and measures of anxiety (r = 0.53), depressive symptoms (r = 0.44), and perceived stress (r = 0.50) supported construct validity. CFA supported the single-factor structure (χ2(35) = 311.2, p, Highlights • People with chronic diseases are at risk if infected with the COVID-19 virus. • The COVID-19 Fears Questionnaire assesses fear among people with medical conditions. • 121 people with scleroderma from 10 countries provided item suggestions. • Validity was supported in a sample of 787 scleroderma patients. • The questionnaire is available for use in studies during the COVID-19 crisis.
- Published
- 2020