Cross-cultural adaptation of the Leisure Functional Rehabilitation Activity Manual to Brazilian Portuguese

Objective: This study aimed to (a) develop a cross-culturally adapted Brazilian version of the Leisure Functional Rehabilitation Activity Manual and (b) evaluate its perceived usability among healthcare professionals. Methods: The study followed a four-phase process: (1) Translation and cultural adaptation – two independent translations of the manual into Brazilian Portuguese were conducted by professionals with distinct backgrounds (one in healthcare, the other in translation studies), followed by a consensus meeting with three research team members to consolidate a final version with culturally adapted images; (2) Expert committee review – five neurorehabilitation specialists from different Brazilian states assessed the synthesized version, evaluating its cultural, semantic, and idiomatic adequacy; (3) Linguistic and semantic equivalence assessment – two independent professionals compared the pre-final version with the original English manual to ensure fidelity in meaning and language; and (4) Perceived usability evaluation – healthcare professionals in neurorehabilitation (who had not participated in earlier phases) provided feedback on the manual’s usability. Results: The Brazilian version demonstrated strong idiomatic and semantic validity, alongside high perceived usability among healthcare professionals. However, while this study focused on cross-cultural adaptation and usability assessment from the perspective of clinicians, it did not evaluate the manual’s clinical applicability with patients. Conclusions: The Brazilian Leisure Functional Rehabilitation Activity Manual is linguistically and culturally suitable for use by healthcare professionals in leisure rehabilitation. Future clinical trials are warranted to assess its efficacy in practical rehabilitation settings.