Validation of Corah's Dental Anxiety Scale

Background-An appropriate scale to assess the dental anxiety of Hindi speaking population is lacking. This study, therefore, aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of Hindi version of one of the oldest dental anxiety scale, Corah’s Dental Anxiety Scale (CDAS) in Hindi speaking Indian adults. Methods-A total of 348 subjects from the outpatient department of a dental hospital in India participated in this cross-sectional study. The scale was cross-culturally adapted by forward and backward translation, committee review and pretesting method. The construct validity of the translated scale was explored with exploratory factor analysis. The correlation of the Hindi version of CDAS with Visual Analogue scale (VAS) was used to measure convergent validity. Reliability was investigated through calculation of Cronbach’s alpha and intra class correlation. Forty-eight forms were completed for test-retest. Results- Prevalence of dental anxiety in the sample with the age range of 18-80 years was 85.63% [95% CI]. The response rate was 100%. After factor analysis, 4 items with single factor (dental anxiety) was obtained. The single factor model explained 61% of variance. Pearson’s correlation coefficient between CDAS and VAS was 0.494. Test- retest showed the Cronbach’s alpha value of 0.814. The test-retest intra-class correlation coefficient of the total CDAS score was 0.881. (95% CI = 0.318 – 0.554) Conclusion- Hindi version of CDAS is a valid and reliable scale to assess dental anxiety in Hindi speaking population. Convergent validity was well recognized but construct validity is limited and requires further studies.