Early Rehabilitation Index: translation and crosscultural adaptation to Brazilian Portuguese; and Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index: validation for use in the intensive care unit

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To translate and cross-culturally adapt the Early Rehabilitation Index to Brazilian Portuguese and validate the Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index for use in the intensive care unit to assess functional status. METHODS: The following steps were performed: preparation, translation, reconciliation, back-translation, revision, harmonization, pretesting, and psychometric evaluation. After this initial process, the Portuguese version was applied by two evaluators to patients hospitalized in the intensive care unit for at least 48 hours. The reliability of the scale was assessed by internal consistency, interrater reliability, and floor and ceiling effects. To measure construct validity, the Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index was correlated with instruments typically used to assess functional status in the intensive care unit. RESULTS: A total of 122 patients with a median age of 56 (46.8 - 66) years participated in the study. The Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index had adequate reliability, with a Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.65. The interrater reliability was excellent, with an intraclass correlation coefficient of 0.94 (95%CI 0.92 - 0.96), and agreement was moderate to excellent, with a kappa agreement index of 0.54 to 1.0. The floor and ceiling effects were minimal. The validity of the Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index was observed through its correlations with the total Perme score (rho = 0.72), the Functional Status Score for the ICU (rho = 0.77), the Physical Function in the Intensive Care Test score (rho = 0.69), and the Medical Research Council sum score (rho = 0.58), in addition to handgrip strength (rho = 0.58) and knee extensor strength measured by hand-held dynamometry (rho = 0.55), all with p < 0.001. CONCLUSION: The adapted versions of the Early Rehabilitation Index for Brazilian Portuguese and, in its entirety, the Early Rehabilitation Barthel Index are reliable and valid for assessing the functional status of patients at discharge from the intensive care unit.