Evaluation of the validity of two written questionnaires for epidemiological study of asthma in younger children

Abstract

There are few validated questionnaires for epidemiological study of asthma in preschool children. In the present study, parental assessments of asthma among their children aged 0-5 years in the response to an International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC)-based and a newly-developed Japanese Pediatric Guideline (JPGL)-based questionnaire were compared with doctors' diagnosis. Out of 369 children recruited from the children who visited their family doctors in 4 hospitals and 3 clinics during November and December 2007, data of 353 children were analyzed. In the children aged 0-2 years, positive predictive values (PPV) of JPGL-based questionnaire for prevalence rate was 0.70, whereas PVV of ISAAC-based questionnaire was only 0.50. Contrary, in the children aged 3-5 years, PPVs of both questionnaires were 0.68 and 0.74, respectively. We suggest that for the purpose of epidemiological study of asthma, JPGL-based questionnaire could be feasible in children aged 0-2 years, and both questionnaires are acceptable for children aged 3-5 years.