Transcultural validation of a French version of the Iowa Satisfaction with Anesthesia Scale (ISAS-F).

PURPOSE: We sought to validate a French translation of the Iowa Satisfaction with Anesthesia Scale (ISAS), a tool to assess the patient's satisfaction with monitored anesthesia care for surgery. The ISAS tool is particularly pertinent as surgery with monitored anesthesia care is increasingly used in ambulatory surgery settings.

METHODS: We studied content validity, internal consistency, convergent validity (vs physician-estimated satisfaction), and test-retest reliability of the French version of the ISAS (ISAS-F) in 122 adult patients undergoing a brief outpatient invasive procedure under conscious sedation. The ISAS-F was answered twice by the patient, once in the postanesthesia care unit and once before discharge from the ambulatory care unit.

RESULTS: The median [interquartile range (IQR)] time of completion at the first assessment was 2 [2-4] min. The total median [IQR] ISAS-F score was 2.3 [1.8-2.7]. Internal consistency of the ISAS-F was found to be good (Cronbach's α = 0.68). Test-retest reliability was significant, with an intra-class correlation coefficient at 0.74 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.63 to 0.85). The ISAS-F score correlated with the physician-estimated satisfaction score, with an intra-class correlation coefficient of 0.28 (95% CI, 0.12 to 0.44; P = 0.01).

DISCUSSION: This validated version of the ISAS can now be used by French-speaking researchers and physicians to assess patient satisfaction with the anesthesia technique.