Computerized adaptive testing and short form development for child and adolescent oral health patient‐reported outcomes measurement

OBJECTIVES: To develop computerized adaptive testing (CAT) and short forms of self‐report oral health measures that are predictive of both the children's oral health status index (COHSI) and the children's oral health referral recommendation (COHRR) scales, for children and adolescents, ages 8–17. MATERIAL AND METHODS: Using final item calibration parameters (discrimination and difficulty parameters) from the item response theory analysis, we performed post hoc CAT simulation. Items most frequently administered in the simulation were incorporated for possible inclusion in final oral health assessment toolkits, to select the best performing eight items for COHSI and COHRR. RESULTS: Two previously identified unidimensional sets of self‐report items consisting of 19 items for the COHSI and 22 items for the COHRR were administered through CAT resulting in eight‐item short forms for both the COHSI and COHRR. Correlations between the simulated CAT scores and the full item bank representing the latent trait are r = .94 for COHSI and r = .96 for COHRR, respectively, which demonstrated high reliability of the CAT and short form. CONCLUSIONS: Using established rigorous measurement development standards, the CAT and corresponding eight‐item short form items for COHSI and COHRR were developed to assess the oral health status of children and adolescents, ages 8–17. These measures demonstrated good psychometric properties and can have clinical utility in oral health screening and evaluation and clinical referral recommendations.