Validation of a Korean Version of the Quality of Life in Childhood Epilepsy Questionnaire(K-QOLCE)

Lim, Kyunghwa; Kang, Hoon Chul; Kim, Heung Dong

Abstract

PURPOSE: There has been no adequate measure of health-related quality of life specifically for children with epilepsy. The aim of this study was 1) to develop a Korean version of the QOLCE, an epilepsy-specific HRQOL, 2) to confirm its reliability and validity.
METHODS
The QOLCE was adapted to Korean language through a translation-backtranslation procedure. The subjects were 219 children (M:F=117:102) with epilepsy (age 4-17 years) and their guardians. They completed a questionnaire of 42-items covering five domains:physical function, emotional well-being, cognitive function, social function, and behavior. We assessed internal consistency and test-retest reliability. Construct validity was assessed by correlating scales of the K-CBCL, Korean version of Child Behavior Checklist.
RESULTS
The internal consistency reliability estimated by Cronbach's a coefficient was 0.86 (ranged 0.77-0.94) for adequate reliability (p<0.05). To assess the convergent and discriminant item validities, correlations between each of the 15 subscales in the QOLCE were obtained. Each scale highly correlated with theoretically similar scales but correlation between theoretically dissimilar subscales was not high (p<0.01). For construct validity, a comparison was made between QOLCE subscales and the CBCL subscales. QOLCE subscales were significantly related to the CBCL subscales (p<0.05)
CONCLUSIONS
This study demonstrated that the Korean version of the QOLCE was a reliable and valid measure at a level of comparable with the original version. These results indicate that this new instrument may be a feasible medical or surgical outcome measure for children with epilepsy.