[Validation in literary Arabic among Tunisian soldiers of the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder checklist for DSM-5].

Abstract

Introduction: post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a topical issue due to the increase in armed conflicts and terrorist attacks in recent decades. The PCL-5 scale is used to screen and monitor patients with PTSD. The aim of our work was to validate a literary Arabic version of this scale on a population of Tunisian soldiers.

Methods: the translation of the PCL-5 scale into Tunisian literary Arabic was performed according to the back-translation technique described by Werner and Campbell and recommended by Brislin. Cross-cultural validation was conducted in 7 steps according to Vallerand's method. Data collection was conducted at the psychiatry department of the Military Hospital of Tunis from February 2019 to December 2020.

Results: we recruited 300 military personnel, 150 of whom were followed for PTSD. Cronbach's alpha was 0.98 indicating good internal consistency. The study of inter-item correlations revealed a total Spearman index of 0.75. This index indicates a good homogeneity of the translated scale items. Construct validity was checked using the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin index (K-M-O) and Bartlett's test of sphericity. The latter was significant (p<0.000), and the K-M-O index was 0.969, indicating that the correlations between the items were of good quality.

Conclusion: our study showed that the Arabic version of the PCL-5 scale has satisfactory psychometric properties comparable to those of the original version.