Peter O Ebigbo
Background: The Enugu Somatization Scale (ESS) measures somatic complaints of psychological origin indicating psychiatric disturbance. The scale was originally designed to measure somatic complaints using a dichotomous Yes / No response. Through observation and feedback it was noted that some information about intensity and frequency might not be captured using Yes / No answer modus.
Aim: (1) To compare intensity and frequency of response as viable options for clinical assessment of somatic complaints. (2) To re-examine the Enugu Somatization Scale (ESS) items several years after its development. (3) To conduct factorial analysis to evaluate the factors within the scale.
Method: The ESS was rescaled to capture intensity and frequency. It was administered to a cross-section of 200 stressed normal purposively drawn from a student group in the Enugu metropolis.
Results: Both measurements; that is intensity and frequency correlated significantly at r = 0.54. Factor analysis of the data showed emergence of two factors. Most items loaded significantly on head and body factors. The internal consistency using frequency was 0.96 and using intensity 0.97. Males scored significantly higher than females both as a whole and in the subscales of Head and Body.
Conclusion: It is important to measure intensity and frequency of somatic complaints, especially given the need to operationalizing somatic complaints in a country where Western diagnostic classification systems might not be most suitable. This makes this study particularly important.
