Validity and reliability of the Persian version of the oral health impact profile (OHIP)-14

Background: the need for assessment of oral health related quality of life has been increased over the last decades. the aim of this study was to develop a persian version of the oral health impact profile (ohip)-14 and to evaluate its reliability and validity for its use in persian-speaking communities. methods: the original version of the ohip-14 was translated into the persian language using the back-translation technique. to establish the reliability of the translated instrument, internal consistency and test-retest reliability trials were performed on 20 subjects (at 4-week intervals); cronbach’s alpha was used. one hundred sixty adults over 50 years of age who attended health care centers in sari and babol were recruited to fill out the questionnaires and received a clinical examination by a single dentist. the socio-demographic and oral health information was also collected. results: the test-retest reliability was excellent (cronbach’s alpha = 0.095). in the main study, cronbach’s reliability coefficient for all 14 questions in each dimension was more than 70%. the individuals in need of dental treatment showed significantly higher ohip scores than the individuals not requiring treatment. the individuals with hopeless teeth, negative self-perceived oral had significantly higher ohip scores. conclusion: the persian version of the ohip-14 is a comprehensive and accurate instrument with acceptable reliability and validity for measuring oral health–related quality of life.