Validation and assessment of voice-related quality of life in Indian patients undergoing total laryngectomy and primary tracheoesophageal puncture.

BACKGROUND: Voice-related quality of life (V-RQOL) has never been studied in Indian patients. This study was planned to validate and assess V-RQOL in patients using tracheoesophageal puncture (TEP).
METHODS: A cross-sectional study was undertaken to validate V-RQOL questionnaire by testing reliability, validity, and responsiveness. V-RQOL was assessed in patients undergoing total laryngectomy with primary TEP.
RESULTS: One hundred thirty-two patients filled 188 questionnaires. Analysis was carried out on 122 patients. Reliability and validity of questionnaire were tested by Cronbach's alpha (.84-.91) and item-scale correlation (.67-.86). Median V-RQOL-Total score was 76.2 indicating excellent V-RQOL. Higher scores were observed in patients less than 50 years (82.5 vs 72.5, p = .08). There was no effect of time interval between laryngectomy and assessment of questionnaire on the V-RQOL scores.
CONCLUSION: V-RQOL questionnaire can be used reliably to assess V-RQOL, which is found to be excellent in Indian patients undergoing TEP. (c) 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Head Neck, 2009.