Cross-cultural adaptation of the 12-item Örebro musculoskeletal screening questionnaire to Japanese (ÖMSQ-12-J), reliability and clinicians’ impressions for practicality

[Purpose] To translate and culturally adapt the Örebro Musculoskeletal Screening Questionnaire (ÖMSQ-12) into Japanese (ÖMSQ-12-J), and to preliminarily investigate practicality from the clinicians’ perspectives, and determine inter-session reliability. [Subjects and Methods] This study included four phases: cross-cultural adaptation (Phases 1–2); survey among 14 clinicians (two medical doctors and 12 physiotherapists) about the practicality of using the questionnaire in six perspectives (speed of evaluation/treatment; capacity to detect patients with yellow flags; attitude towards management with bio-psycho-social perspectives; quality of evaluation/treatment; considerations of communications with patients at history-taking, physical assessments and interventions; and general clinical usefulness) based on their experiences with patients (Phase 3); and investigation of inter-session reliability among 50 patients with musculoskeletal disorders (Phase 4). [Results] The ÖMSQ-12-J was developed in Phases 1–2 using the recommended international guidelines for cultural adaptation and translation. In Phase 3, most responses were in the 3-positive options (35.7–78.6%). In Phase 4, the Intraclass Correlation Coefficient for each item ranged from 0.71–0.99 and 0.92 for the total score. [Conclusion] This study developed the ÖMSQ-12-J, which has preliminary evidence of good practicality and moderate-strong inter-session reliability. Further investigation is required to determine the predictive and prognostic capacity within a problematic musculoskeletal Japanese population.