Validity of a tablet computer version of the Japanese Orthopaedic Association hip disease evaluation questionnaire: a pilot study

The Japanese Orthopaedic Association hip disease evaluation questionnaire (JHEQ) was established as a new patient-reported outcome for patients with hip disease. We developed a JHEQ application beta version for tablet computers. The application has a slider system to input visual analogue scale (VAS) measurements. The purposes of this study were 1) to test whether the VAS that was acquired from this slider system was equal to the value recorded on paper and 2) to evaluate the validity and agreement of the JHEQ tablet version. A total of 57 patients were analyzed in the study (mean age, 60.2 years; range, 29-81 years). They received either the paper-and-pencil version (paper version) or the tablet computer version (tablet version). To evaluate the validity of the tablet version, we analyzed differences in the VAS and total scores between the paper version and tablet computer version. In addition, we calculated Cronbach's alpha, the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), and the Pearson's correlation coefficient (CC). The VAS scores in the tablet version were significantly lower than those in the paper version (22.3 ± 5.4 vs. 17.0 ± 4.5 and 28.1 ± 6.1 vs. 23.5 ± 5.3, respectively; all P < 0.05). Values of Cronbach's alpha, the ICC, and the CC among subscales ranged from 0.90 to 0.95. In conclusion, the total JHEQ score on the tablet computer beta version was in agreement with the score on the paper version. However, the VAS on the tablet version, which used a slider bar system, proved unreliable.