Functional disability assessments are recognized as being important for the diagnosis of Dementia of the Alzheimer's type (DAT) as well as for monitoring the impact of intervention and determining the need for home assistance or institutionalization. Existing instruments designed for the assessment of functional disability with this population are generally unsatisfactory with regards to their content or psychometric properties. The objective of this research project was to develop a more appropriate French and English assessment of functional disability for use with proxy-respondents of community-dwelling individuals who have DAT. The Disability Assessment for Dementia (DAD) was developed in several stages using three panels composed of health care professionals and caregivers of individuals with DAT. Forward-backward translation procedures were performed at each stage to ensure that the French and English versions of the scale were comparable. Content validity was verified by a fourth panel of experts. The DAD was then administered to 59 community-dwelling DAT subjects and their caregivers to determine internal consistency and the need to eliminate items. The instrument developed, which consisted of 46 items, was reduced to 40 items, 17 related to basic self-care and 23 to instrumental activities of daily living, as a result of this process. The content validity of the final version was established by a majority of members from the panel of experts. It also demonstrated a high degree of internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.96) and excellent interrater (N = 31) and test-retest (N = 45) reliability (Intraclass correlation coefficients of 0.95 and 0.96 respectively). In addition, it was found not to have gender bias. Estimates of its validity were determined in another study. The DAD represents a valid and reliable instrument which is short and easy to administer. This instrument should have a positive impact on geriatric rehabilitation, and on clinical and
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.28756 |
| Date | January 1995 |
| Creators | Gélinas, Isabelle |
| Contributors | Gauthier, Louise (advisor), Wood-Dauphinee, Sharon (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Doctor of Philosophy (School of Physical and Occupational Therapy.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001453370, proquestno: NN05710, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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