SCIENTIFIC SESSION

Functional social support is one of the most well-established predictors of health, with the Duke-UNC Functional Social Support Questionnaire (DUFSS) being one of the instruments most commonly used to measure it. A systematic review was conducted of the measurement and administration characteristics of the various versions of the DUFSS, and they were evaluated using the Evaluating the Measurement of Patient-Reported Outcomes (EMPRO) tool. This tool was designed to measure the quality of PRO instruments through eight attributes: conceptual and measurement model, reliability, validity, responsiveness to change, interpretability, burden, alternative modes of administration, cultural and linguistic adaptations. Four different versions of the DUFSS questionnaire were identified (14, 11, 8 and 5 items). The 11-item version obtained higher scores in the evaluation of the EMPRO attributes, with a total score of 54.01; whereas the 8-, 14- and 5-item versions obtained 36.31, 27.48 and 23.81 points, respectively. Of the 4 identified versions of the DUFSS questionnaire, the one rated most highly by the standardised EMPRO tool was the 11-item version.