Validation and reliability study of the Turkish version of the Neuroquality of Life (Neuro-QoL)-Stigma Scale for neurological disorders

Background/aim: Stigma can be defined as a negative perception of chronically ill patients by their relatives or by society, or a similar self-perception by the patients themselves. We aimed to validate the Turkish version of the Neuroquality of Life (Neuro-QoL)-Stigma Scale for neurologic diseases. Materials and methods: Forms were filled out by a total of 152 randomized patients under regular follow-up in the outpatient clinic (29 polyneuropathy, 25 epilepsy, 23 stroke, 24 tension-type headache, 28 multiple sclerosis, 27 Parkinson disease). The forms consisted of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), WHOQOL-BREF quality of life scale, the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS), the General Self-Efficacy (GSE) scale, and the Neuro-QoL-Stigma scale. Results: The internal consistency of the Neuro-QoL-Stigma scale showed Cronbach's a coefficients of 0.95 for all groups. The mean scores of the stigma scales were 33.42 +/- 13.91 (min-max: 24-87). There were strong negative correlations between high stigma scores and GSE-T, MSPSS-T, and WHOQOL-BREF, and a positive correlation with the BDI and BAI. Conclusion: The Turkish version of Neuro-QoL-Stigma has satisfactory content validity and high internal consistency. Neuro-QoL-Stigma is suitable for understanding stigmatization in different neurological disorders in the Turkish population.