Translation and cross-cultural adaptation of Swallow Outcomes After Laryngectomy Questionnaire (SOAL) to Brazilian Portuguese

Purpose: To develop the adaptation of the Swallow Outcomes After Laryngectomy Questionnaire -SOAL for the Brazilian culture. Metkods: Validation study restricted to translation and cross-cultural adaptation. The following steps were followed: discussion of the need for the instrument in the Brazilian context, two independent translations, synthesis of the translations, analysis by a committee of 12 expert judges in Dysphagia and Oncology fields, analysis of the judges' comments and of the Content Validity Indexes per item and of the questionnaire, application of the questionnaire in a sample of 10 total laryngectomy patients, back translation and final synthesis. Results: it was necessary to perform semantic, syntactic / grammatical, experiential, idiomatic and content equivalences, mainly after the analysis by experts. The Content Validity Index per item and of the questionnaire were acceptable in all the aspects evaluated. The back translation was equivalent to the original version. The comparison between the original, translated and back-translated versions made the final version of the instrument viable. Conclusion: the adaptation of SOAL to the Brazilian culture was developed. The validation process will continue from the version presented in this study.