BACKGROUND: The Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy - Spiritual Well-being (FACIT-Sp) was developed in the United States to assess quality of life in relation to spirituality. We translated the FACIT-Sp into Arabic and assessed its reliability and validity among a diverse sample of Arab cancer patients. We present the data on the psychometric properties of that translation. METHOD: Three native Arabic speakers translated the FACIT-Sp into Arabic; their translations were merged. The merged translation was back-translated and checked against the English version. After consulting an Arabic-fluent linguist, we arrived at a penultimate translation. We cognitively debriefed 30 cancer patients at the King Hussein Cancer Center, Amman, Jordan, on the penultimate translation. Based on these results, we arrived at a final translation. Using the final translation, 205 cancer patients (73% Muslim, 7% Christian, 20% unknown religion) with various cancers at various stages of disease in treatment at the King Hussein Cancer Center, Amman, Jordan, completed the FACIT-Sp. RESULTS: The mean (SD) for the FACIT-Sp was 89.89 (11.3); Cronbach's alpha reliability coefficient, an evaluation of internal consistency, was .83. Means (SD) and Cronbach's alpha for subscales were: Physical well-being (PWB) 17.3 (5.8) and .80; Social/ family well-being (SWB) 18.5 (4.2) and .80; Emotional well-being (EWB) 16.8 (5.2) and .80; Functional well-being (FWB) 17.4 (5.3) and .83; Spiritual well-being (SpWB) 37.4 (6.7) and .83. Factor loading confirmed PWB, SWB, EWB, and FWB as subscales and showed that the 12 questions of the SpWB subscale could be broken down into three additional subscales: Peace, Meaning, and Faith. CONCLUSIONS: Consistent with psychometric testing of the FACIT-Sp in English and other languages, the Arabic version of the FACIT-Sp is a psychometrically sound measure of spiritual well-being for Arabic-speaking cancer patients. Factor analysis confirms the 5 major subscales of the FACIT-Sp (PWB, SWB, EWB, FWB, and SpWB), and the three subscales of the 12-question SpWB subscale. RESEARCH IMPLICATIONS: The FACIT-Sp is a useful tool for further research on the role of spiritual wellbeing in the quality of life of Arabic-speaking cancer patients. To further explicate the role of religion in spiritual well-being, future research may assess spiritual well-being with the FACIT-Sp in the context of patients' religion-specific behaviors. CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS: The Arabic version of the FACIT-Sp is a valid and sound tool for psycho-oncology clinicians to use to assess the spiritual well-being of patients, thus making possible the assessment of spiritual well-being as part of the routine cancer care of patients who speak Arabic.

Lazenby M, Khatib J. Reliability and validity of the arabic translation of the functional assessment of chronic illness therapy-spiritual well-being. Psycho-Oncology. 2011;20:261.

https://insights.ovid.com/pscyho-oncology/ponc/2011/10/002/reliability-validity-arabic-translation-functional/440/01445499