The Design of a Practice-based Study of Attendees at Chiropractic Offices in Western Australia.

Introduction: This paper presents the protocols for a pilot study that will provide a design critique and collect information to describe the patients who attend chiropractors in Western Australia. Aims and Objectives: 1. Provide a critique of the research design and methodology, including enrolment and recruitment, data collection, and sample size calculations. 2. Describe the patient demographics, reason for consultation and baseline health status of patients that present to chiropractic practices in Western Australia. Methods/Research Design: This will be a prospective, cross-sectional, practice-based pilot study of patients seeking chiropractic services in Western Australia. A minimum of seven (7) independent private chiropractic practices across urban, regional, rural and remote settings will be recruited. Consecutive adult patients that self-present to these practices for the first time will be invited to participate. Data for analysis will be collected in participating clinics using a computer-based online questionnaire. Data collected will include; patient demographics; age, gender, primary language, occupation, payment source, presenting complaint, prior treatment, pre-existing health conditions, medications, attendance at other health practitioners, lifestyle choices, previous use of chiropractic and human quality of life measures (HQoL’s; SF-12 and PIQ-R). Priori sample size estimation indicates a total sample of 320 would be sufficient to achieve a study power of >80% (assumed effect size 0.2, α=0.05, assumed df=5). Conclusion: Innovative electronic and internet portals for gathering practice-based data are to be assessed. Information describing patients who attend allied and complementary practitioners is critical to facilitate appropriate and effective health system planning and administration in Western Australia.

Bangla translation, adaptation and piloting of Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale.

Standardized questionnaires for screening common health problems in the community often need to be translated for use in non-English speaking countries. There is a lack of literature documenting the process of translation of such questionnaire/scale that would enable their application in cross-cultural settings and standardization of the procedure. This paper reports the process of translation into Bangla of the widely used Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale (EPDS) for use in Bangladesh. Three methods: forward translation, committee translation, and back translation were used to ensure the equivalence of the translated version. Both the English and Bangla versions were piloted among 10 social science graduates who were proficient in both the languages. The concurrence of each respondent between the two versions showed a correlation coefficient of 0.98 (p < 0.01). The Bland-Altman test also showed a high degree of agreement. The piloted version was also tested with 15 women in the postnatal period and found to be suitable for women with lower educational attainment. The documentation of the translation process and the lessons learnt would be helpful in similar settings where screening questionnaires need to be adapted for local use.