Assessing the Construct Validity and Reliability of School Health Records Using the ‘Health Dialogue Questionnaire’ in the Eleventh Grade

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The aim for this study was to assess the construct validity and reliability of the Health Dialogue Questionnaire (HDQ(©)) for eleventh grade in school through comparison of the HDQ(©) with Paediatric Quality Of Life Inventory (PedsQL™), Local monitoring of youth policy questionnaire (LUPP(®)), Health behaviour in Swedish school-aged children (HBSC(©)), Equal health (EH(©)) and The Swedish Survey Youth on Alcohol Consumption (SSYAC(©)). METHODS: Cross-sectional samples of eleventh graders from the academic year 2009/2010 was used from the HDQ(©) (n = 2752), the HBSC(©) (n = 2090), the PedsQL™ (n = 666), the “LUPP(®)” questionnaires (n = 2400), EH(©) (n = 258), and SSYAC(©) (n = 1748) in the academic year 2009/2010. A comparison between HDQ(©) and the different proxies was done. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed as well as a Multitrait-Multimethod Matrix (MTMM), in order to evaluate the construct validity and reliability of HDQ(©). RESULTS: An average disagreement between HDQ(©) and proxies with 10 percentages was found. Exploratory factor analysis of HDQ(©) on the 2009/2010 sample suggested a four factor solution (girls factor solution 65% of total variance explained, and in the boys' solution 59% of total variance explained). A second sample 2010/2011 of eleventh graders were used for the confirmatory solution. Almost perfectly similar four factor solutions with were found (girls 58% of total variance explained and boys 56% of the total variance explained). Using MTMM the reliability was generally high and HDQ(©) and showed agreeable validity. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS: The HDQ(©) questionnaire is a reliable and valid instrument for measuring eleventh graders self-reported-health in school.