Validade da versão brasileira do Finctional Activities Questionnaire (FAQ-BR) para aferição da capacidade funcional do idoso.

Abstract

The functional capacity presents itself as an important component in the health care model for older people due to being referred to the capability to perform daily life activities, or even to the physical and mental skills in order to maintain an independent and autonomous life. This thesis has investigated the validity of the Brazilian version of Functional Activities Questionnaire (FAQ-BR) for measuring the functional capacity of the elderly, based on the report of the informant, using baseline data from a cohort of non-institutionalized elderly patients from a health care provider, the Estudo Fragilidade em Idosos Brasileiros - Seção Rio de Janeiro. To evaluate the structure dimensions and the validity of construct of FAQ-BR, data from 525 elderly and their respective informants were analyzed: confirming factorial analyzes tested the dimensional structure and Pearson's correlation coefficients and tau of Kendall assessed the construct validity, verifying the direction of correlations between its score and variables related to the functional capacity of the elderly identified in the literature. The internal consistency of the FAQ-BR was assessed by composite reliability. To evaluate the accuracy of the FAQ-BR in screening for dementia, data were analyzed from 265 elderly and their respective informants: the performance of the scale was compared to the clinical diagnosis of dementia in the elderly and Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to compare the score of the FAQ-BR with those obtained by the Brazilian versions of the Mini-Mental State Examination, applied to the elderly, and the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly. All the correlations were compatible with the underlying theory. The factorial analyzes showed items with high loadings (> 0,60) in single dimension with tuning parameters of the model and internal consistency (≥ 0,85). However, residual correlations involving six pairs of items were identified. The area under the ROC curve was 0.846 (95% CI 0,832 - 0,916) and the cut-off point > 13 was identified as one of maximum sensitivity (80,0%; 95% CI 71,5 - 86,9) and specificity (72,0%; 95% CI 64,1 - 79,0) for detection of dementia. The score of the FAQ-BR showed high correlations and statistically significant with the scores of Brazilian versions of the Mini-Mental State Examination (r = - 0,624; p < 0,001) and the Informant Questionnaire on Cognitive Decline in the Elderly (r = 0,755; p < 0,001). It was concluded that the FAQ-BR is a simple instrument, whose psychometric qualities demonstrated in this thesis allow to recommend its application for screening of dementia, only. For the measurement of the elderly functional capacity it is not prudent to recommend its use immediately, because further studies are needed to investigate whether the item exclusion is the central aspect to the scale refinement.