Multi-Dimensional Health Assessment Questionnaire in China: Reliability, Validity and Clinical Value in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis

OBJECTIVE To evaluate the psychometric properties and clinical utility of Chinese Multidimensional Health Assessment Questionnaire (MDHAQ-C) in patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) in China. METHODS 162 RA patients were recruited in the evaluation process. The reliability of the questionnaire was tested by internal consistency and item analysis. Convergent validity was assessed by correlations of MDHAQ-C with Health Assessment Questionnaire (HAQ), the 36-item Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36) and the Hospital anxiety and depression scales (HAD). Discriminant validity was tested in groups of patients with varied disease activities and functional classes. To evaluate the clinical values, correlations were calculated between MDHAQ-C and indices of clinical relevance and disease activity. Agreement with the Disease Activity Score (DAS28) and Clinical Disease Activity Index (CDAI) was estimated. RESULTS The Cronbach's alpha was 0.944 in the Function scale (FN) and 0.768 in the scale of psychological status (PS). The item analysis indicated all the items of FN and PS are correlated at an acceptable level. MDHAQ-C correlated with the questionnaires significantly in most scales and scores of scales differed significantly in groups of different disease activity and functional status. MDHAQ-C has moderate to high correlation with most clinical indices and high correlation with a spearman coefficient of 0.701 for DAS 28 and 0.843 for CDAI. The overall agreement of categories was satisfying. CONCLUSION MDHAQ-C is a reliable, valid instrument for functional measurement and a feasible, informative quantitative index for busy clinical settings in Chinese RA patients.