Romanian Translation and Cross-Cultural Adaptation of the SarQol Questionnaire

Sarcopenia, or age-related muscle loss is emerging as a major public health concern. A reduced quality of life (QoL) due to impaired physical performance associated with this disease has been evidenced in these individuals.Generic instruments, such as Short Form 36 questionnaire (SF-36), do not accurately assess the impact of sarcopenia on QoL. SarQol (Sarcopenia Quality of Life) questionnaire, was the first disease-specific questionnaire addressing quality of life in patients with sarcopenia and has been recently designed for providing a global picture on quality of life in community-dwelling elderly subjects aged 65 years and older. Our aim was the translation and cultural adaptation of the original SarQol, to finally obtain a highly reliable instrument for the assessment of the quality of life of Romanian patients, affected by sarcopenia.
We followed the recommended process, the international protocol of translation. The pretest process involved 20 subjects (10 sarcopenic and 10 non sarcopenic with different educational and socioeconomic backgrounds) who were asked to complete the questionnaire. Feedbacks were requested from all subjects regarding the clearness of questions, difficulties in completing the test or understanding the meaning of questions. Using the recommended best practice protocol for translation, the pre-final version is comparable with the original instrument in terms of content and accuracy. After the validation of psychometric properties, it should be a useful tool to assess Quality of Life and sarcopenia among elderly Romanian patients.