Prospective validation of the short form liver disease quality of life instrument.

BACKGROUND: Despite the realization that health-related quality of life (HRQOL) is an important outcome in patients with liver disease, there is scarcity of disease-targeted HRQOL measures that have undergone prospective evaluation. AIM: To validate prospectively the short form of liver disease quality of life instrument (the SF-LDQOL) in patients with advanced liver disease.
METHODS: The SF-LDQOL includes 36 disease-targeted items representing nine domains: symptoms of liver disease, effects of liver disease, memory/concentration, sleep, hopelessness, distress, loneliness, stigma of liver disease and sexual problems. We administered the SF-LDQOL to 156 advanced liver disease patients at baseline and at 6-month follow-up. We estimated internal consistency reliability for multi-item scales, item discrimination across scale and evaluated construct validity by estimating the associations of SF-LDQOL scores with SF-36 scores, symptom severity and disability days. To evaluate the SF-LDQOL's responsiveness, we compared HRQOL changes for patients who received with those who did not receive liver transplantation (LT).
RESULTS: The internal consistency reliability coefficients were > or = 0.70 for seven of nine scales in baseline and for all scales in follow-up administration. The SF-LDQOL correlated highly with SF-36 scores, symptom severity, disability days and global health. Patients undergoing LT reported improved HRQOL compared with patients without LT and the responsiveness indices were excellent.
CONCLUSIONS: This study provides support for the reliability and validity of the SF-LDQOL in patients with advanced chronic liver disease. This instrument may be useful in everyday clinical practice and in future clinical trials.