Article

There is lack of a German-language holistic stroke-specific
health-related quality of life (HRQOL) measure with therapeutically-oriented
domains. The objective of this study was to investigate the psychometric
properties of the HRQOL in stroke patients (HRQOLISP) questionnaire in German
stroke survivors. METHODS: Following standard procedure for cross-cultural
validation, the HRQOLISP was translated into German. It was completed by 103
German stroke patients and 50 apparently healthy controls. Acceptance, ceiling
and floor effects, reliability, as well as content, construct, factorial and
known-group's validity were analysed. Stratification was according to modified
Rankin, stroke levity and National Institute of Health stroke scales. RESULTS:
The HRQOLISP was acceptable and holistic with neither ceiling nor floor effect.
One-factor solution explained >40% of the variance for most domains. Two-factor
solution explained 82% of the variance for the global HRQOL consistent with the
conceptual framework distributing the therapeutically-oriented domains into two
spheres. Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.77 to 0.92 for the domains. The HRQOLISP,
though lengthy, covered the entire spectrum of stroke-related HRQOL with no
additional item suggested by the German stroke patients. The HRQOLISP
demonstrated good convergent and discriminant validity as well as excellent
'known groups' validity across disability and stroke severity strata.
CONCLUSIONS: The German version of the HRQOLISP is the first holistic,
stroke-specific HRQOLISP measures with therapeutically-oriented domains to be
validated in Germany. It is acceptable, reliable and valid but needs to be
validated in proxies to facilitate its utility among stroke patients with severe
communication problems.

Langue : ANGLAIS