Kannada translation and cross-cultural adaptation of the SarQol®: sarcopenia specific quality of life questionnaire

Abstract Background Sarcopenia Quality of life questionnaire (SarQol) in Indian vernacular language is limited to Hindi, Marathi, and Bengali. Objective To translate and cross-culturally adapt the original Sarcopenia Quality of Life Questionnaire (SarQol) to the Kannada language Methods The rights owners of the SarQoL questionnaire granted permission for translation and cross-cultural adaption, and the translation was articulated in five stages: (i) two initial translations from English to Kannada; (ii) synthesis of the two translations; (iii) backward translations; (iv) expert committee to compare the backward translations with the original questionnaire and (v) pre-test. Result Six items identified in phase I were rectified in second phase. There found to be thirteen major and nine minor discrepancies between back-translated and original questionnaire. Expert committee meeting addressed the discrepancy using the liberal and literal methods to maintain the content and semantic equivalence. Nineteen participants were recruited for pilot testing. To assess for the presence of sarcopenia, participants (n = 10 sarcopenic, n = 9 non-sarcopenic) responded to the Strength, Ambulation, Rising from a chair, Stair climbing and history of Falling (SARC-F). Participants (n = 19, Males/Females: 11/8; Sarcopenic/Non-sarcopenic, mean (SD) age: 71.8 (8.48) years/68.22 (6.14) years) provided suggestions and feedback for seven items which were discussed with the experts and final SarQol-Kannada version was produced. Conclusion The Kannada version of the SarQol questionnaire is comparable with the original and after the validation of psychometric properties, it would be a useful tool to assess the quality of life of Kannada-speaking sarcopenic older adults in clinical and research settings.