Translation and Psychometrics of Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale

Edmonton symptom assessment scale (ESAS) has been developed to assess objective and subjective symptoms in patients with cancer in all stages of their disease. The aim of the study was to translate and determine the psychometric properties of ESAS in Iranian population.
The current study was carried out to determine the reliability and validity of ESAS using 246 patients with cancer in Imam Khomeini hospital, Ardabil, Iran in 2016. After translating the instrument into Persian, content and face validity, discriminant validity, construct validity (confirmatory factor analysis), internal consistency and test-retest were performed to determine the psychometric properties of ESAS. To determine construct validity of the scale, confirmatory factor analysis was used by LISREL software version 8.8, and the other analyses were calculated by using SPSS software version 15.
Regard to good fitness indices including CFI, IFI, NFI, factor structure of ESAS with one factor were confirmed by the nine items. Discriminant validity was confirmed by finding significant differences between two groups, patients with good and ill status. Cronbach’s alpha for the overall ESAS was 0.88, and correlation between test-retest with 4-6h interval was 0.86 (r=0.86, p This study showed that Persian version of ESAS is an applicable tool for assessing symptoms distress in patients with cancer in Iranian society. This study might be the first step for utilizing this scale in any medical, rehabilitative and palliative care centers related to patients with cancer.