Measure
The National Institute of Health-developed PROMIS tools are a set of
person-centered measures to evaluate various physical, mental and social
health concerns across many populations. The PROMIS Sexual Function and
Satisfaction (SexFS) tools are a set of measures aimed at assessing
sexual function and satisfaction. These tools have gender-specific
coordinating versions and have been validated in adult (mean age 58.5
years) cancer populations.21,22 The PROMIS SexFS
includes multiple validated (content validity, face validity, construct
validity and reliability) modules that can be selected to obtain
detailed information about various types of SD. Specifically, in adult
cancer populations, the PROMIS SexFS tools demonstrate high internal
consistency (Cronbach’s alpha 0.87-0.95) and favorable test-retest
reliability (0.71–0.87).21 In this study, we
evaluated the PROMIS v.2.0 Brief Profile SexFS , which was created to be
a clinically useful general screening tool and consists of 10 questions
for males and 14 questions for females.9,21,22 As
described below, an additional set of similarly formatted questions on a
different topic, anxiety, were used for a practice round.
PROMIS measures were administered and managed using REDCap electronic
data capture tools hosted at the University of Colorado
Denver.33 REDCap (Research Electronic Data Capture) is
a secure, web-based application designed to support data capture for
research studies. In contrast to the intended presentation of the SexFS
Brief each item was presented individually to facilitate Think-Aloud.