Year: 2026 | Month: April-June | Volume: 11 | Issue: 2 | Pages: 202-212
DOI: https://doi.org/10.52403/ijshr.20260225
Cultural Adaptation and Content Validation of an Educational Booklet in Kannada Language for Knee Osteoarthritis Patients: A Pilot Study
R. Kamalakannan1, Ajay Kumar2, Afraa Marium3, Aiswarya P.G4, Akshayapurushothaman5, Akhiya6
1Associate Professor, 2Professor, 3,4,5,6Interns,
Department of Musculoskeletal and Sports Physiotherapy, Institute of Physiotherapy, Srinivas University, Mangaluru, Karnataka.
Corresponding Author: R. Kamalakannan
ABSTRACT
Background: Knee osteoarthritis (OA) affects approximately 28.7% of India's population, with significant impact on community health by reducing quality of life and function. Despite the availability of evidence-based management strategies, culturally appropriate educational resources in regional languages remain scarce, creating barriers to effective community-level intervention. This study aimed to culturally adapt and validate the content of an educational booklet in Kannada for patients with knee OA.
Materials and method: This mixed-design(approach) pilot interventional study was conducted the institution based musculoskeletal physiotherapy department and medical college hospital, The study involved three phases: (1) Development of educational booklet through systematic literature review; (2) Content validation using Delphi consensus with five experts and patient focus group; (3) Pilot testing with 30 Kannada-speaking knee osteoarthritis patients allocated to intervention (booklet + exercises, n=15) or control (exercises only, n=15) groups.. Outcomes were measured using the Numerical Pain Rating Scale (NPRS), Knee Injury and Osteoarthritis Outcome Score (KOOS), Pain Self-Efficacy Questionnaire (PSEQ), and Tampa Scale of Kinesiophobia (TSK).
Results: Content validation achieved excellent validity (S-CVI/Ave=0.96). Both groups showed significant within-group improvements (p<0.05) in all outcome measures after 3 weeks. The intervention group demonstrated marginally better improvements, though between-group differences were not statistically significant (p>0.05), likely due to small sample size.
CONCLUSION: This study successfully developed a culturally appropriate, validated educational resource in Kannada for community-based knee osteoarthritis management. The findings support the integration of linguistically appropriate educational materials in community health programs for knee osteoarthritis management.
Keywords: Knee Osteoarthritis, Patient Education, Community health, Kannada language, Cultural adaptation, public health intervention.