Medicina Comunitária e Educação em Saúde

Abstrato

Brazilian Version for Screening Adolescents Drug Use: Crafft/Cesare

Pereira BAAX and Azevedo RCS

Objective: To evaluate the responsiveness and validity of the Brazilian version of CRAFFT as a screening drug test in adolescents.
Method: Descriptive and quantitative research, which assessed the applicability through a convenience sampling of technical school’s students (14-21 years). Kappa coefficient was applied to investigate the correspondence between CRAFFT and CEBRID questionnaires and and the ROC curve was performed to evaluate the psychometric properties of CRAFFT.
Results: 1882 students answered the CRAFFT/CESARE questionnaire. The minority of students (2.2%) had problems in comprehending the scale. CRAFFT/CESARE questionnaire’s specificity achieved 73.3%, and it’s sensitivity, 87.1%. The correlations between the questionnaires were considered good (Kappa: 0,461). Six hundred eighty-two (36.2%) of the 1882 adolescents scored positive for CRAFFT/CESARE. Visual inspection of the receiver operating characteristic curve presented the optimal cut point of 2 or more.
Conclusion: Our findings support the utility of the Brazilian version of CRAFFT/CESARE as a screening tool for use of psychoactive substances among Portuguese-speaking Brazilian adolescents. Its characteristics and psychometric properties makes it possible to use in the Brazilian sociocultural context.