Food Avoidance Beliefs and Behaviors Among Chinese Cancer Patients: Validation of a New Measurement Tool.
OBJECTIVE
Restrictive food avoidance behavior among Chinese cancer patients is common. Yet, to the authors' knowledge, no study has investigated factors associated with such behavior. This study attempted to validate a new measurement tool, the Cancer Patients Food Avoidance Behaviors Scale (CPFAB), that assessed cancer patients' belief regarding 5 perceived benefits of practicing food avoidance, and to test its applicability.


DESIGN
Cross-sectional face-to-face interviews.


SETTING
Two outpatient oncology clinics in 2 different districts of Hong Kong.


PARTICIPANTS
A total of 245 patients with nasopharyngeal and colorectal cancer.


MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES
Assessment of psychometric properties of the CPFAB.


ANALYSIS
Principal components method with oblique (Promax) rotations was performed to investigate the factor structure of the CPFAB.


RESULTS
Psychometric properties, which included test-retest intraclass correlations (mean = 0.72; SD = 0.12), Cronbach α (.88-.94), floor (0.4% to 5.7%) and ceiling (0% to 7.3%) effects, and item-subscale (0.67-0.79) and subscale-total (0.68-0.89) correlations, were satisfactory.


CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS
The CPFAB, a new instrument used to assess food avoidance, was developed and validated. It showed satisfactory psychometric properties and can be used to evaluate interventions that seek to modify food avoidance attitudes among cancer patients.
['Yung|Tony K C|TKC|', 'Kim|Jean H|JH|', 'Leung|Sing-Fai|SF|', 'Yeung|Rebecca M W|RMW|', 'Poon|Annette N Y|ANY|', 'Au|Edmond W C|EWC|', 'Lau|Joseph T F|JTF|']
D000328:Adult D000368:Aged D044466:Asians D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies D005247:Feeding Behavior D005260:Female D006723:Hong Kong D006801:Humans D007407:Interviews as Topic D008297:Male D008875:Middle Aged D009303:Nasopharyngeal Neoplasms D015596:Nutrition Assessment D011594:Psychometrics
food avoidance Cancer patients dietary intake scale validation