Translation and cultural adaptation of Glasgow Antipsychotic Side-effects Scale (GASS) in Arabic

Abstract

BackgroundIn view of a constant increase in the number of patients treated with antipsychotic medications, the problem of nonadherence to the prescribed treatment becomes particularly relevant. Since one of the major contributors to the nonadherence is the presence of side effects of the drugs being used, the availability of tools for assessment of adverse reactions is of great importance.ObjectiveThe objective of the present work was to develop an Arabic language version of the Glasgow Antipsychotic Side-effect Scale (GASS).MethodsAfter confirming the accuracy of translation, the questionnaire was given to 100 patients in two psychiatric centers in Saudi Arabia.ResultsThe Cronbach’s alpha (0.793) indicated a good reliability of the survey. The mean GASS score was 19.09, indicating absent or mild side effects of antipsychotics, but 46% of patients experienced moderate, and 25% experienced severe side effects. An analysis of the correlation between patients’ characteristics and side effects revealed the presence of a positive relationship between the side effects and health literacy.ConclusionsIt is expected that the Arabic-GASS will benefit Arabic-speaking psychiatric patients by helping them to express their concerns about side effects of antipsychotics. The collected results also document the importance of patients’ health literacy in achieving high-quality healthcare.

Clinical validation of the self-reported Glasgow Antipsychotic Side-effect Scale using the clinician-rated UKU side-effect scale as gold standard reference

“…The Glasgow Antipsychotic Side-effect Scale (GASS) (Waddell and Taylor, 2008) is a reliable multi-domain self-report questionnaire developed for screening the frequency and associated distress of antipsychotic side effects (AlRuthia et al, 2018; Ignjatovic Ristic et al, 2018). The GASS has several advantages over other self-report questionnaires due to its brevity, global multi-domain coverage and simple, self-explanatory layperson language (Haddad et al, 2014).…”

Validation of the Glasgow Antipsychotic Side-Effect Scale (GASS) in an Italian Sample of Patients with Stable Schizophrenia and Bipolar Spectrum Disorders

“…The translation and validation study of the GASS scale we performed adds to the studies already available [ 18 , 19 , 20 ]. As previously highlighted in the Greek and Arabic translations [ 19 , 20 ], the scale maintains good internal consistency, an element not investigated by the Danish validation [ 18 ].…”

“…The translation and validation study of the GASS scale we performed adds to the studies already available [ 18 , 19 , 20 ]. As previously highlighted in the Greek and Arabic translations [ 19 , 20 ], the scale maintains good internal consistency, an element not investigated by the Danish validation [ 18 ]. However, consistency with the gold standard (measured by criterion validity) was not as satisfactory as in the Danish validation, although relatively robust for more than half of the items.…”

“…However, consistency with the gold standard (measured by criterion validity) was not as satisfactory as in the Danish validation, although relatively robust for more than half of the items. Finally, the CFA, characterized by a different analytical approach to the one applied by Arab researchers [ 20 ], showed that the one-factor analysis did not fit well. Therefore, further exploratory factor analysis could be carried out to elucidate the scale structure.…”

“…The GASS is a self-administered scale initially developed in English [ 17 ] and translated into other languages [ 18 , 19 , 20 ]. It is a 22-item self-rated questionnaire used to assess AP-induced weight gain; sedation; central nervous system (CNS), cardiovascular, gastrointestinal, and genitourinary functioning; extrapyramidal and anticholinergic activity; diabetes; and prolactin-related SE.…”