|
|
| Home |
| Articles in Press |
| Current Issue |
| All Issues |
| Alerts |
| Most popular articles |
| Editorial Board |
| Advertising |
| Search Tools |
Volume 17 Issue 3 September 2008Assessing atopic disease in children two to six years old: reliability of a revised questionnaire • Original Research Pages 164-168 *Torbjørn Øiena, Ola Storrøa, Roar Johnsenb a Research Fellow, Department of Public Health and General Practice, Faculty of Medicine, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), Trondheim, Norway b Professor, Department of Public Health and General Practice, Faculty of Medicine, NTNU, Trondheim Received 18 December 2006 • Accepted 25 January 2008 • Online 16 March 2008 Abstract BACKGROUND: Primary intervention – reducing second hand smoking (SHS), indoor dampness, and increased intake of omega-3-fatty acids – for allergic diseases such as asthma, rhinoconjunctivitis, and eczema/dermatitis in children was started in Trondheim in 2002. To our knowledge, no validated or reliable questionnaires for the study age groups were available. AIMS: To test the reliability of a revised questionnaire for studying atopic disease in children two to six years old in Trondheim. METHODS: Seventy-seven families were invited to fill in a questionnaire adapted from the ISAAC protocol which was made appropriate for the age group studied. Completed questionnaires and information from medical records were compared, and the agreement was analysed by Kappa statistics and proportional agreement. RESULTS: Agreement was excellent for questions reporting current information such as doctor-diagnosed asthma (κ=0.88), whether or not the child had had an allergy test (κ=0.82), and use of antibiotics (κ=0.81). The agreement was good for questions concerning doctor or hospital treatment for asthma (κ=0.59), medication for asthma (κ=0.58), symptoms of eczema (κ=0.56), medication for allergic disease (κ=0.45), and past infections (κ=0.53). CONCLUSION: Questions on asthma diagnosis, allergy testing, and use of antibiotics were reliable. Questions on medical treatment for eczema, allergic rhinoconjunctivitis and infections were less reliable, representing a potential source of information bias and possible misclassification. Keywords Questionnaires, reliability, primary prevention, asthma, allergy, allergic rhinitis, allergic conjunctivitis, eczema View full text as PDF document Right click on this DOI link and copy link to cite this article (What is a DOI link?) * Corresponding author. Torbjørn Øien Tel: +47 735 98876 Fax: +47 735 98876 Email: torbjorn.oien@ntnu.no |
Website developed
and maintained by danzigdesigns.com