GUIDELINES FOR REPORTING RESULTS OF QUALITY-OF-LIFE ASSESSMENTS IN CLINICAL-TRIALS

Clinical trials involving quality of life measurement published in the literature suffer from important weaknesses due to the lack of inform ation on numerous topics. The psychometric properties of the instrumen ts are often lacking as well as data on the number of patients treated and analyzed. The handling of missing data is rarely documented. In o rder to facilitate the reporting of trials and the evaluation of publi shed results, this article proposes a set of general guidelines for th e reporting of clinical trials which include a quality of life assessm ent. A checklist designed to assist authors is appended.