Validity and reliability study for the Turkish version of global pain scale

Introduction: To investigate the validity and reliability of the "Global Pain Scale" for Turkish population. Methods: The cross-sectional study was conducted at the Algology outpatient clinic of a university hospital in Izmir, Turkey, between March and December 2015, and comprised patients with chronic pain aged at least 18 years. Linguistic equivalence, content validity and construct validity were used for establishing the validity of the Global Pain Scale, while the Content Validity Index was used for the assessment of expert views. SPSS 16was used for data analysis. Results: Of the 222 subjects, 142(64%) were females. Overall mean age of the sample was 54.22 +/- 13.79 years. Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the entire scale was 0.95. Total item correlation coefficients of the items in the scale ranged between 0.502 and 0.794, and no items were removed from the scale. Conclusion: The Global Pain Scale was found to have adequate validity and reliability indicators, and can be used with confidence in patients experiencing chronic pain.