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Patients’ views on the utility of quality of life questionnaires in head and neck cancer: a randomised trial
Author(s) -
Srinivasan R.T.,
Morton R.P.,
Mehanna H.M.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
clinical otolaryngology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.914
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1749-4486
pISSN - 1749-4478
DOI - 10.1111/j.1749-4486.2006.01236_17.x
Subject(s) - medicine , quality of life (healthcare) , referral , physical therapy , head and neck cancer , family medicine , cancer , nursing
Objectives. (i) Evaluate head and neck cancer (HNC) patient perspectives regarding the usefulness of quality of life questionnaires (QLQ) in communicating their health problems to clinicians; (ii) identify the QLQ that HNC patients find most useful. Design. Randomised questionnaire study. Patients completed all four validated HNC QLQs. Order of questionnaire presentation was randomised to counterbalance for order effects. Participants. Eighty patients diagnosed and treated for HNC in a tertiary referral HNC centre. Outcome measures. Patient ratings of perceived usefulness and preferences of studied questionnaires. Results. Patients reported high relevance to their problems and high ease of understanding of all questionnaires, with FACT scoring highest (79% and 89% respectively). 58% participants (67% respondents) would like to complete a questionnaire in clinic, as it would help them describe their health problems to their doctors; 28% of participants did not. Almost half preferred a particular QLQ, FACT being most preferred. Conclusions. Patients report that HNC QLQs effectively describe their health concerns. Most are in favour of completing QLQs in clinic, as an aid for describing health problems to clinicians. There appears to be a difference between clinicians and patients regarding perceived usefulness of QLQs in the clinic setting.