REPRODUCIBILITY AND VALIDITY OF QUALITY-OF-LIFE MEASUREMENTS IN HYPERTENSIVE PATIENTS ON STABLE MEDICATION

Objective: The reproducibility and validity of a hypertension-specific questionnaire and a generic health questionnaire (the MOS Short-form General Health Survey) were evaluated for measuring the quality of lif e in a randomized controlled trial comparing balloon angioplasty and l ong-term medication in patients with renovascular hypertension. Method s: The health questionnaires were filled out by 97 patients with hyper tension on stable medication. The reproducibility of the questionnaire s was assessed by intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs). Pearson' s correlation coefficients were calculated between the scales of the q uestionnaires to evaluate the validity. Results: Medication had been c hanged to eliminate side-effects in an earlier phase of treatment. Onl y 7% of the patients reported non-compliance with the medication regim e. Most patients suffered from physical symptoms, but the impact of lo ng-term antihypertensive medication on the quality of life was not sub stantial. The reproducibility was good for most scales (ICC > 0.70), e xcept for the role and social functioning scales. All correlations bet ween the scales of the questionnaires were statistically significant a nd no contradictory correlations were found. Conclusions: The health q uestionnaires together form a reproducible and valid instrument for me asuring the quality of life of hypertensive patients on stable medicat ion. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science B.V.