Development and multicenter study on Korean pediatric asthma caregiver's quality of life questionnaire (KPACQLQ)

Cha, Jae Kook; Oh, Jae Won; Hong, Soo Jong; Lee, Hae Ran; Lee, Myung Ik; Kim, Kyu Earn; Lee, Joon Sung; Lee, Ha Baik; Lee, Sang Il

Abstract

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE
Asthma is the most common chronic disease among children. Thus, when children have asthma, it can have a significant impact on health-related quality of life, not only for children, but also for parents and family. We developed to measure asthma- specific quality of life in caregivers of children with asthma age 7~17 years and evaluated the measurement properties of the questionnaire. MATERIALS AND METHOD: The questionnaire of caregivers of children with asthma include 13 items in two areas (activity limitation-4 items, emotional function-9 items) and the response options for each item are on a 5-point scale where 1 indicates maximum impairement and 5 indicates no impairement. Results are expressed as the mean score for overall quality of life as well as for each of the domains. At follow-up visit, we asked caregivers whether they had experienced any change in their overall quality of life related to their children's asthma since the previous visit. They responded on a 11-point scale from -5 (a very great deal worse) to 0 (no change) to +5 (a very great deal better). We recruited 195 caregivers of children with asthma from thirty-three general hospitals and evaluated the measurement properties of the questionnaire. RESULT: The questionnaire of caregivers of children with asthma showed excellent responsiveness in changed group, but the change in score of stable and changed group has no difference. It was reproducible in subjects who are stable. There was no longitudinal and crosssectional correlations between caregiver's questionnaire score and the child's asthma status, while cross-sectional correlations were found between caregiver's questionnaire score and PEFR.
CONCLUSION
The questionnaire of caregivers of children with asthma is simple and easy to use, and is applicable.