RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Validity and Reliability of an Arabic Version of the STOP-Bang Questionnaire for Identifying Obstructive Sleep Apnea
Ahmed S. BaHammam*, Alaa M. Al-Aqeel, Alanoud A. Alhedyani, Ghaida I. Al-Obaid, Mashail M. Al-Owais, Awad H. Olaish
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2015Volume: 9
First Page: 22
Last Page: 29
Publisher ID: TORMJ-9-22
DOI: 10.2174/1874306401509010022
Article History:
Received Date: 13/12/2014Revision Received Date: 24/2/2015
Acceptance Date: 24/2/2015
Electronic publication date: 27/2/2015
Collection year: 2015
open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
Background:
Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common, serious, under-recognized and under-diagnosed medical disorder. Polysomnography (PSG) is the gold standard diagnostic test for OSA; however, the cost of testing and the shortage of sleep disorders laboratories limit access to this tool. Therefore, there is a need for a simple and reliable diagnostic tool to screen patients at risk of OSA.
Objective:
This study was conducted to evaluate the validity and reliability of an Arabic version of the STOP-Bang questionnaire (SBQ) as a screening tool for OSA.
Methods:
This study was conducted in three steps, as follows: Step 1: the SBQ was translated from English to Arabic (examining both forward and backward translations); Step 2: the test-retest reliability of the questionnaire was investigated; and Step 3: the questionnaire was validated against PSG data prospectively on 100 patients attending a sleep disorders clinic who were subjected to a full-night PSG study after completing the translated version of the SBQ. The validity of the test was tested against the apnea-hypopnea index (AHI).
Results:
The study group had a mean age of 46.6 ± 14.0 years and a mean AHI of 50.0 ± 37.0/hour. The study demonstrated a high degree of internal consistency and stability over time for the translated SBQ. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient for the 8-item tool was 0.7. Validation of the SBQ against the AHI at a cut-off of 5 revealed a sensitivity of 98% and positive and negative predictive values of 86% and 67%, respectively.
Conclusion:
The Arabic version of the SBQ is an easy-to-administer, simple, reliable and valid tool for the identification of OSA in the sleep disorders clinic setting.
