Validation of the Persian version of Elder Abuse Suspicion Index© (EASI)

Elder abuse is one of the serious and dangerous forms of domestic violence that have been the focus of communities and health care professionals for the past few years. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to validate the Persian version of the Elder Abuse Suspicion Index among older community in Iran.

This cross-sectional study was conducted in Ahvaz (Khuzestan Province), Iran 2019 on 2020 older people. After translation, the convergent validity, , and the degree of agreement between the two evaluators (Cohen's kappa) were performed to assess construct validity. Reliability was assessed by calculation Cronbach’s alpha coefficient. In addition, the known group comparison was also investigated. The ROC curve was used to calculate sensitivity, specificity and cut off point.

The Persian version of this index had acceptable face validity and content validity. The results of convergent validity and concurrent validity, the correlation between the EASI and the domestic mistreatment towards the elderly in the family questionnaire was 0.74 at a significance level. The known groups comparison was significant. The overall kappa coefficient between two evaluators was determined to be 0.873. Also, the value of Cronbach's alpha coefficient for the index was estimated at 0.716. Sensitivity and specificity based on ROC curve at cut point 1 were equal to 62% and 96%, respectively, and the area under ROC curve was determined to be 0.807.

The findings indicated that the Persian version of the Elder Abuse Suspicion Index (EASI) is a valid instrument and can be used at primary care settings.