PSYCHOMETRIC PROPERTIES OF BREALD-30 FOR BRAZILIAN ADOLESCENTS AGED 15-TO-19-YEAR-OLD

Objectives: To evaluate the psychometric properties of the Brazilian Portuguese version of the Rapid Estimate of Adult Literacy in Dentistry (BREALD-30) administered to Brazilian adolescents.
Methods: The study comprised 375 adolescents aged 15 to 19 years attending public and private schools in Campina Grande, PB, Brazil. Reliability was measured based on internal consistency and test-retest reliability. Convergent validity was measured based on correlations between BREALD-30 and the Functional Literacy Indicator (FLI) scores. Divergent validity was measured by comparing BREALD-30 scores with sociodemographic variables. For predictive validity, the association between BREALD-30 scores and the presence of cavitated carious lesions was tested using a multiple logistic regression model. All statistical tests were performed with a 5% level of significance.
Results: The BREALD-30 demonstrated good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.834) test-retest reliability (ICC = 0.974; Kappa = 0.808). Moreover the item-total correlation was satisfactory for all items. The instrument presented convergent validity with the FLI (r_s = 0.652, p <0.001). Participants with higher oral health literacy levels attended private schools (p <0.001), belonged to economic classes A and B1 (p < 0.001) and had parents with higher level of education (p <0.001), indicating the divergent validity of the instrument. Adolescents with lower BREALD-30 scores were more likely to have cavitated carious lesions with values of OR = 1.96; 95% CI: 1.24-3.11, respectively.
Conclusions: The BREALD-30 demonstrated satisfactory psychometric properties for use on Brazilian adolescents aged 15 to 19 years and can be applied as a fast, simple, reliable measure of oral health literacy.