Generic or disease-specific quality of life scales to characterize health status in allergic rhinitis?

Background: In patients with allergic rhinitis (AR), various instruments ha ve been validated for the measurement of quality of life (QOL), which may b e greatly reduced. However, it is not clear which QOL instruments should be used for the different types of AR and whether they are sensitive to treat ment. Methods: The QOL of patients suffering from symptomatic seasonal AR (sSAR) (before and during treatment with a topical or systemic antihistamine), sym ptomatic perennial AR (SPAR), and asymptomatic seasonal AR (aSAR) was deter mined with the Rhinoconjunctivitis Quality of Life Questionnaire (RQLQ) as disease specific and with the Munich Life Dimension List (MLDL) and the Vis ual Analogue Scale for Quality of Life (VAS-QOL) as generic QOL instruments . Results: The different forms of AR were associated with typical QOL pattern s. In sSAR, we found severe limitation of the global QOL, reduced global li fe satisfaction, high ranking of practical problems, high limitation of act ivity, and a high degree of disturbance in all subscales of the RQLQ. In sP AR, there were moderate limitation of the global QOL, normal global life sa tisfaction, high ranking of practical problems, moderate limitation of acti vity, and a high degree of disturbance by common symptoms. Under antihistam ine treatment, both systemic and nasal, a significant improvement of OL par ameters was found, reaching the levels of patients with aSAR Lifter 2 weeks . Conclusions: QOL instruments can distinguish the impairment resulting from sSAR from that of SPAR and are sensitive to treatment with topical and syst emic antihistamines. however, as the RQLQ was not designed to measure the s hort-term variations of disease status that appear in SAR, it may not demon strate the rapid improvement of QOL under antihistamine treatment.