Psychometric Properties of Telugu Version of Scale of Oral Health Outcomes for 5-year-old Children.

Introduction: Only a finite number of standard oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) measures are available for young children. However, instead of using parents as proxies to report a child's oral health status, children's self-reported oral health measures would be more accurate in providing their own perceptions of oral impacts.

Aim: The study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of the Telugu version of the scale of oral health outcomes (SOHO-5T) for 5-year-old children in Telangana.

Materials And Methods: The forward-backward translated SOHO-5T was pilot-tested among thirty children. The tested questionnaire was administered to 419 children, followed by a clinical oral examination using dentition status to evaluate dental caries (DC). Children ( = 30) were readministered the same questionnaire after a 2-week interval to test reliability. Internal consistency and test-retest reliability were determined by Cronbach's α and intraclass correlation. Correlation with global ratings of oral health questions was done to assess construct validity. Discriminant validity was evaluated based on the presence or absence of DC. A < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: The mean SOHO-5T score was 4.70, and the mean decayed teeth score was 2.48, with 49.16% of children having DC. Cronbach's α scores and the intraclass correlation (ICC) coefficient for overall SOHO-5T were 0.90 and 0.91, respectively. SOHO-5T also demonstrated good construct validity with a significant positive correlation with global ratings of oral health. SOHO-5T showed good discrimination between the presence (9.43 ± 3.10), or absence (0.14 ± 1.01) of DC.

Conclusion: This study shows good internal consistency and test-retest reliability. It also exhibited good construct and discriminant validity.

How To Cite This Article: Meghana D, Sukhabogi JR, Doshi D, Psychometric Properties of Telugu Version of Scale of Oral Health Outcomes for 5-year-old Children. Int J Clin Pediatr Dent 2024;17(8):933-937.