Translation and Cultural Adaptation of adult PROMIS Physical Function Short Forms into Simplified Chinese

Abstract Background: The Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) has been proven to be an effective and efficient measurement tool and has entered its global promotion phase. Our research team was authorized by the PROMIS Health Organization to translate five adult Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) physical function short forms (4a, 6b, 8b, 8c, and 8c 7-Day) to ensure the conceptual and semantical equivalence to the source and pretest them in a Chinese population for cultural adaptation.Methods: The translation was conducted following the Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy (FACIT) methodology, which mainly includes forward translation, reconciliation, back-translation, expert reviews, cognitive testing, and linguistic validation, etc. And cognitive interview was used to pretest the translated items in Chinese patients with cancer and a healthy population.Results: The translation process was relatively smooth, except for some translated versions that slightly altered some word choices or sentence structures. Subsequent pre-testing of the Simplified Chinese short forms showed that clarifying or laying emphasis on the time frame in the instructions was needful, and two sets of response categories and one item stem needed some slight revisions due to cultural or language discrepancies.Conclusion: The translation and linguistic validation of five adult PROMIS physical function short forms into Simplified Chinese have been completed, and field testing, calibration, and psychometric testing are pending.