One of the most important indicators of effectiveness of therapy in patients with fecal incontinence (FI) can be patient's quality of life. Therefore, a well-constructed questionnaires studying quality of life is necessary. The objective of this study was to assess the Iranian version of Fecal Incontinence Quality of Life Scale in a hospital-based study on patients with FI.

Two hundred women were recruited in the study. One group included patients with FI (n = 100) and the control group (n = 100) included patients with any gastrointestinal (GI) problems except FI. The Persian version of fecal incontinence quality of life scale completed by groups. The FI patients completed the SF-36 questionnaire too. Reliability and validity of questionnaire were evaluated by Cronbach's alpha, test/retest using correlation analysis, Intraclss correlation coefficient, paired t-test, and analysis of variance.

Mean age of FI patients and controls were 42.6 (±13.3) and 44.5 (±15.0) respectively. Cronbach's-α for all domains ranged between 0.72–0.92. All scales showed significant correlation between the test and retest administration of questionnaire. The FI patients had lower scores than the controls for all domains adjusted for gender. All correlations between six selected domains of Sf-36 scales and FIQL scales were significant at P < 0.05 levels.

The Persian version of FIQL had a good validity and reliability and can be used for accurate measure of quality of life in FI patients.