TOPICOP©: A New Scale Evaluating Topical Corticosteroid Phobia among Atopic Dermatitis Outpatients and Their Parents

Leïla Moret, Emmanuelle Anthoine, Hélène Aubert-Wastiaux, Anne Le Rhun, Christophe Leux, Juliette Mazereeuw-Hautier, Jean-François Stalder and Sébastien Barbarot

PLOS ONE, 2013, vol. 8, issue 10, 1-6

Abstract: Background: The fear of using topical corticosteroids, usually called topical corticophobia, is a frequent concern for atopic dermatitis patients and/or their parents. Assessing patients’ atopic dermatitis and their parents’ topical corticosteroid phobia is an essential step to improving adherence to treatment. Because topical corticophobia appears to be a complex phenomenon, its evaluation by binary responses (yes/no) is too simplistic. Thus, a scale is needed, which is capable of identifying the subtleties of topical corticosteroid phobia. Objectives: To develop and validate a scale, TOPICOP©, measuring worries and beliefs about topical corticosteroids among atopic dermatitis outpatients and their parents. Methods: An initial statistical validation of TOPICOP was carried out, collecting qualitative data about patients’ topical corticophobia behaviors and beliefs using focus-group methodology. Then, 208 outpatients or their parents from five French centers completed a self-administered questionnaire built from focus-group results. The scale-development process comprised an explanatory principal component analysis, Cronbach’s α-coefficients and structural equation modeling. Results: The validated questionnaire comprised 12 items, covering two important dimensions relative to “worries” (6 items) and “beliefs” (6 items). Psychometric properties showed that items had very good communality (>0.60) within their own dimension. The final two-factor solution accounted for 47.3% of the variance. Cronbach’s α-coefficients were, respectively, 0.79 and 0.78. Structural equation modeling strongly supported the possibility of calculating a global score. Conclusions: TOPICOP© is the first scale aimed at assessing topical corticophobia in adult patients and parents of children with eczema. TOPICOP® has excellent psychometric properties and should be easy to use in everyday clinical practice for clinicians and researchers. Further studies are needed to confirm our results and validate TOPICOP© in other cultures.

Date: 2013
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pone00:0076493

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0076493

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