Measurement of parent satisfaction in french-speaking PICUs: a need for translation and cultural adaptation of the empathic questionnaire

Background and aims: Family-centred care is an expected standard in PICU and parent reported outcomes are rarely measured. The Dutch validated EMPATHIC questionnaire provides accurate measures of parental perceptions of family-centred care in PICU. A French version would provide an important resource for quality control and benchmarking with other PICUs. The study aimed to translate and to assess the French cultural adaptation of the EMPATHIC questionnaire. Methods: In September 2012, following approval from the developer, translation and cultural adaptation were performed using a structured method (Wild et al. 2005). This included forward-backward translation and reconciliation by an official translator, harmonization assessed by the research team, and cognitive debriefing with the target users' population. In this last step, a convenience sample of parents with PICU experience assessed the comprehensibility and cultural relevance of the 65-item French EMPATHIC questionnaire. The PICUs in Lausanne, Switzerland and Lille, France participated. Results: Seventeen parents, including 13 French native and 4 French as second language speakers, tested the cognitive equivalence and cultural relevance of the French EMPATHIC questionnaire. The mean agreement for comprehensibility of all 65 items reached 90.2%. Three items fell below the cut-off 80% agreement and were revised for inclusion in the final French version. Conclusions: The translation and the cultural adaptation permitted to highlight a few cultural differences that did not interfere with the main construct of the EMPATHIC questionnaire. Reliability and validity testing with a new sample of parents is needed to strengthen the psychometric properties of the French EMPATHIC questionnaire.