Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (B-IPQ)

The Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (B-IPQ) is a tool used to evaluate cognitive and emotional representations of illness (Broadbent et al. 2006). It is an eight-item questionnaire that assesses cognitive illness representation, emotional illness representation, and illness comprehensibility representation.

Validity and Reliability

Various studies evaluated the psychometric properties of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (B-IPQ) in various populations, and its psychometric evaluation indicates good concurrent and predictive validity, sensitivity to change, and good test-retest reliability (Timmermans et al. 2017, Hallegraeff et al. 2013, Machado et al. 2019, Zhang et al. 2017). The B-IPQ has been found to have good internal consistency, satisfactory construct validity, and acceptable to good psychometric properties (Timmermans et al. 2017, Hallegraeff et al. 2013, Machado et al. 2019, Zhang et al. 2017, Kuiper et al. 2022).

The B-IPQ has been validated in many illnesses such as diabetes, asthma, renal disease, cancer, and also minor illnesses (Machado et al. 2019). The B-IPQ has been shown to be a useful tool in predicting attendance rates at diabetic outpatient clinics (Kuiper et al. 2022). The B-IPQ score offers the possibility of assessing the extent to which illness perception is threatening for the patient (Rivera et al. 2022). The B-IPQ has been found to have significant positive correlations between total B-IPQ score and depression and anxiety (Rivera et al. 2022). Therefore, the B-IPQ is a reliable and valid tool for assessing cognitive and emotional representations of illness in various populations.

Scoring and Interpretation

To score the B-IPQ questionnaire, each item is rated on a 0-10 scale, with higher scores indicating a more threatening perception of the illness. The total score is calculated by summing the scores of all eight items where items 3, 4, and 7 are inversed. The possible range of scores is 0-80. Higher scores indicate worse illness perception. Kuiper et al (2022) report cut-off points for the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (B-IPQ) total score as follows: <42 indicating low experienced threat, 42-49 indicating moderate experienced threat, and ≥50 indicating high experienced threat in patients with a recently acquired spinal cord injury.

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References

Broadbent, E., Petrie, K. J., Main, J., & Weinman, J. (2006). The brief illness perception questionnaire. Journal of psychosomatic research, 60(6), 631–637. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpsychores.2005.10.020

Timmermans, I., Versteeg, H., Meine, M., Pedersen, S. S., & Denollet, J. (2017). Illness perceptions in patients with heart failure and an implantable cardioverter defibrillator: Dimensional structure, validity, and correlates of the brief illness perception questionnaire in Dutch, French and German patients. Journal of psychosomatic research, 97, 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpsychores.2017.03.014

Hallegraeff, J. M., van der Schans, C. P., Krijnen, W. P., & de Greef, M. H. (2013). Measurement of acute nonspecific low back pain perception in primary care physical therapy: reliability and validity of the brief illness perception questionnaire. BMC musculoskeletal disorders, 14, 53. https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2474-14-53

Kuiper, H., van Leeuwen, C. M. C., Stolwijk-Swüste, J. M., & Post, M. W. M. (2022). Reliability and validity of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (B-IPQ) in individuals with a recently acquired spinal cord injury. Clinical rehabilitation, 36(4), 550–557. https://doi.org/10.1177/02692155211061813

Machado, V., Botelho, J., Ramos, C., Proença, L., Alves, R., Cavacas, M. A., & Mendes, J. J. (2019). Psychometric properties of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (Brief-IPQ) in periodontal diseases. Journal of clinical periodontology, 46(12), 1183–1191. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcpe.13186

Rivera, E., Levoy, K., Clark-Cutaia, M. N., Schrauben, S., Townsend, R. R., Rahman, M., Lash, J., Saunders, M., Frazier, R., Rincon-Choles, H., & Hirschman, K. B. (2022). Content Validity Assessment of the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire in CKD Using Qualitative Methods. International journal of environmental research and public health, 19(14), 8654. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19148654

Zhang N, Fielding R, Soong I, Chan KK, Lee C, Ng A, Sze WK, Tsang J, Lee V, Lam WW. Psychometric assessment of the Chinese version of the brief illness perception questionnaire in breast cancer survivors. PLoS One. 2017 Mar 20;12(3):e0174093. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0174093. PMID: 28319160; PMCID: PMC5358881.

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