Purpose: This study aimed to obtain a translation and validation of the Fear of Pain Questionnaire 9 Items (FOP-9) into simplified Chinese.
Methods: The questionnaire was translated following the forward-backward method. The final version was filled out by (n = 300) patients. Cronbach’s coefficient was calculated to test the internal consistency of simplified Chinese version of FOP-9 (sc-FOP-9), and 50 painless patients completed the sc-FOP-9 questionnaire within a 2-weeks interval to evaluate test–retest reliability. To verify the construct validity, exploratory factor analysis was used to explore the factor structure, and confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to evaluate the goodness fit of models.
Results: Satisfactory psychometric qualities were obtained (Cronbach’s α of the total score was 0.873 and intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.975). Three first-order models were tested and all show a good model fit and the 3-factor structure may be better due to its higher factor loading.
Conclusion: The sc-FOP-9 is a reliable and valid instrument to evaluate the fear of pain among Chinese patients with or without pain. Fear of pain may have an important effect on perioperative pain and chronic pain, and this tool is a good complement to the measurement in mainland China.
Keywords: fear of pain, reliability, validity, Chinese, pain-related fear