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. 2021 Jul;110(7):2267-2279.
doi: 10.1111/apa.15872. Epub 2021 May 6.

Paediatric patients report lower health-related quality of life in daily clinical practice compared to new normative PedsQLTM data

Maud M van Muilekom  1 , Michiel A J Luijten  1   2 , Hedy A van Oers  1 , Thirsa Conijn  1 , Heleen Maurice-Stam  3 , Johannes B van Goudoever  4 , Martha A Grootenhuis  3 , Lotte Haverman  1 ; KLIK collaborator group
Collaborators, Affiliations

Paediatric patients report lower health-related quality of life in daily clinical practice compared to new normative PedsQLTM data

Maud M van Muilekom et al. Acta Paediatr. 2021 Jul.

Abstract

Aim: To compare Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQOL) of paediatric patients with newly collected HRQOL data of the general Dutch population, explore responses to individual items and investigate variables associated with HRQOL.

Methods: Children (8-12y) and adolescents (13-17y) from the general population (N = 966) and from a paediatric population (N = 1209) completed the Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory (PedsQLTM ) online via the KLIK Patient-Reported Outcome Measures portal. PedsQLTM scale scores were compared between groups with independent t tests, by age group and gender. Responses to PedsQLTM items were explored using descriptive analyses. Linear regression analyses were performed to determine which variables were associated with HRQOL.

Results: Paediatric patients reported worse HRQOL than the general population on all PedsQLTM scales (p ≤ .001, d = 0.20-1.03), except social functioning, and a high proportion reported problems on PedsQLTM items, for example, 'I have trouble sleeping'. Younger age, female gender and school absence were negatively associated with HRQOL (β = -0.37-0.10, p ≤ .008).

Conclusion: Paediatric patients reported lower HRQOL than the general population, and school absence, female gender and younger age were associated with lower HRQOL. The results underline the importance to structurally monitor paediatric patients' HRQOL in clinical practice to detect problems and offer the right help on time.

Keywords: Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory; clinical practice; health-related quality of life; paediatric patients; patient-reported outcome measures.

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Conflict of interest statement

All authors have no financial or other conflicts of interest to disclose.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Feedback over time of the PedsQLTM in the KLIK ePROfile: (A) individual items in traffic light colours, (B) scale scores including a healthy reference line
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Updated feedback of the PedsQLTM over time in the KLIK ePROfile by providing reference lines of the general population (upper line) and CHC group (lower line) for boys (A) and girls (B) separately and per age group (shown by shift of reference line) and information about school absence of the patient (C)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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