LAUSR

Background Our aim was to develop a measure of eating attitudes and behaviours (EAB) in cystic fibrosis (CF), examine its psychometric properties and conduct initial validation analyses. There are no current measures of EAB suitable for use in the CF population. The intention is to make the measure available for use clinically as a routine measure of EAB in CF. This will be particularly useful given the serious health consequences of poor nutritional status (likely to be related to EAB) in CF and may help to guide treatment planning (i.e., specialist eating disorder service or in-house management by CF team) Methods An initial item generation and piloting stage involved literature searches of EAB in CF and eating disorders and how they are measured, consultation with professionals and cognitive interviewing with 8 individuals with CF. The final measure was then administered to 150 participants with CF (11–65 years) recruited from tertiary CF clinics, who are representative of the wider CF population. Participants also completed a series of questions about adherence to other treatments and an existing measure of EAB used in the general population. Other clinical and demographic information was gathered from participants’ notes. Results A final measure was developed using standard statistical analyses for assessing the reliability of a measure (exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach’s alpha analyses). Preliminary validation of the measure was carried out by examining its relationships with hypothetically related variables such as clinical status (lung function), body mass index (BMI), adherence and the existing EAB measure. Conclusion The measure is published and available free of charge (CFEAB).