Summary
Background : Anxiety related to gastrointestinal sensations, symptoms or the contexts in which these may occur is thought to play a significant role in the pathophysiology as well as in the health outcomes of patients with irritable bowel syndrome.
Aim : To develop a valid and reliable psychometric instrument that measures gastrointestinal symptom‐specific anxiety.
Methods : External and internal expert panels as well as a patient focus group evaluated a large pool of potential item stems gathered from the psychological and gastrointestinal literature. Potential scale items were then administered to 96 patients diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome along with a set of validating questionnaires. Final item selection was based upon rigorous empirical criteria and the psychometric properties of the final scale were examined.
Results : A final unidimensional 15‐item scale, the Visceral Sensitivity Index, demonstrated excellent reliability as well as good content, convergent, divergent and predictive validity.
Conclusions : The findings suggest that the Visceral Sensitivity Index is a reliable, valid measure of gastrointestinal symptom‐specific anxiety that may be useful for clinical assessment, treatment outcome studies, and mechanistic studies of the role of symptom‐related anxiety in patients with irritable bowel syndrome.