Summary
The aim of this study is to adapt Falls Efficacy Scale (FES) for us age in Lithuania and re li abil ity of the Lithuanian version of FES and evaluate patients with peripheral vestibular disorder fear of falling.
Material and methods. The translation from English to Lithuania, linguistic cultural adaptation and validation by international standards of scale was made. The scale was presented to 115 healthy control group – with out peripheral vestibular disorder and to 115 patients with peripheral vestibular disorder (with Meniere’s disease, benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, and former vestibular neuritis and other unspecified peripheral vertigo).
Results. High test–re test results showed reliability of Falls Efficacy Scale: Cronbach’s al pha co ef fi cient was 0.932 for common scale. Spearman–Brow coefficient was 0.304. Falls Efficacy Scale showed good reliability between the initial and repeated tests (Pearson correlation 0.535) compared to the healthy population and population with fear of fall. In order to determine stability and validity of the falls efficacy scale, 34 patients were surveyed for the 2nd time and analysis was performed. Receiver operating character is tic analysis was performed. The result (0.829) shows that Falls Efficacy Scale is relatively good and has a sufficiently/ rather high sensitivity (76%) and specificity of 90–95%.
Conclusion. Statistical analysis of Lithuanian Falls Efficacy Scale version proved that scale is reliable and appropriate to differentiate patients with vestibular disorder, who have a greater fear of falling than healthy people.
