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The Concerns About Recurrence Questionnaire: validation of a brief measure of fear of cancer recurrence amongst Danish and Australian breast cancer survivors

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Abstract

Purpose

Fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) is prevalent amongst survivors, and breast cancer survivors are particularly vulnerable. Currently, there are few well-validated brief measures of FCR and none specific to breast cancer. This manuscript describes the development and initial validation of a new measure of FCR for breast cancer survivors, the Concerns about Recurrence Questionnaire (CARQ), and reports its initial validation in an Australian and Danish population-based sample of breast cancer survivors.

Methods

CTT analyses explored scale reliability and validity; Rasch analyses explored model fit statistics, item bias (DIF) and local dependency. Three-item, four-item and five-item versions were considered.

Results

Two hundred eighteen Australian women aged 28–45 years diagnosed with early-stage breast cancer (stages 0–2) and 2001 Danish women diagnosed with breast cancer (stages 1–3) aged 26–70 completed the CARQ. Based on the results of both CTT and IRT analyses, the four-item English version of the scale performed best. Although the CTT analyses suggested that the CARQ-4 was reliable and valid in both samples, Rasch analyses identified item bias relative to age, and local dependence which may be remedied by further scale development.

Conclusions

The CARQ-4 English version is currently one of the most rigorously tested brief scales of FCR available.

Implications for Cancer Survivors

The availability of more valid and reliable brief measures of FCR will help to promote research and screening of FCR amongst cancer survivors.

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Acknowledgements

B. Thewes was supported by a National Breast Cancer Post-Doctoral Research Fellowship. This study was funded by a Union for International Cancer Control Yamagiwa-Yoshida International Cancer Grant. P. Butow was supported by a NH&MRC Research Fellowship Award. We also wish to thank the Danish Cancer Society for financial support (PP05020) and the Danish Breast cancer Cooperative Group (DBCG) for providing the clinical data for the Danish sample.

Conflict of interest

The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Medical Psychology and Evidence-Based Decision-Making School of Psychology Transient Building, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, 2006, Australia

    Belinda Thewes & Phyllis Butow

  2. Unit for Psychooncology and Health Psychology, Department of Psychology and Behavioural Sciences, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Robert Zachariae & Søren Christensen

  3. Department of Oncology, Aarhus University Hospital, Aarhus, Denmark

    Robert Zachariae & Søren Christensen

  4. Department of Psychology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark

    Tine Nielsen

  5. Psycho-Oncology Cooperative Research Group (PoCOG), School of Psychology, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

    Phyllis Butow

Authors
  1. Belinda Thewes
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  2. Robert Zachariae
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  3. Søren Christensen
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  4. Tine Nielsen
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  5. Phyllis Butow
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Correspondence to Belinda Thewes.

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Thewes, B., Zachariae, R., Christensen, S. et al. The Concerns About Recurrence Questionnaire: validation of a brief measure of fear of cancer recurrence amongst Danish and Australian breast cancer survivors. J Cancer Surviv 9, 68–79 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11764-014-0383-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11764-014-0383-1

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