Adaptation of the Manchester-Minneapolis Quality of Life instrument for use in the UK population

• Published in: Archives of disease in childhood Vol. 92; no. 10; pp. 855 - 860
• Main Authors: Hutchings, H A, Upton, P, Cheung, W-Y, Maddocks, A, Eiser, C, Williams, J G, Russell, I T, Jackson, S, Jenney, M E M
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health 01.10.2007; BMJ; BMJ Publishing Group Ltd; BMJ Publishing Group LTD; BMJ Group
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Adults; Asthma; Asthma - epidemiology; Asthma - psychology; Biological and medical sciences; Cancer; Case-Control Studies; Child; Child health; Children; Children & youth; chronic illness; Chronic illnesses; Coding; Control Groups; Demographic aspects; Diabetes; Diabetes Mellitus - epidemiology; Diabetes Mellitus - psychology; Education; Factor Analysis; Factor Analysis, Statistical; Female; General aspects; Health aspects; Health Conditions; Health Status; Health surveys; health-related quality of life; Humans; Learning Problems; Male; Medical sciences; Miscellaneous; Original; paediatrics; Parent Responsibility; Prevention and actions; Psychometrics; public care; Public health. Hygiene; Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine; Quality of life; Quality of Life - psychology; Quantitative psychology; Questionnaires; Reproducibility of Results; Schools; Surveys; Surveys and Questionnaires - standards; Test Reliability; United Kingdom - epidemiology; Validity; United Kingdom; Europe; United Kingdom > UK; Human; Evaluation; Pediatrics; Questionnaire; Use; Population; Psychometrics; Child; Public health; Adaptation; Quality of life
• ISSN: 0003-9888; 1468-2044
• DOI: 10.1136/adc.2006.098947

Introduction:The availability of health-related quality of life (HRQL) measures that are reliable, valid, brief and comprehensible and appropriate for use with UK children is limited. We report the validation of a HRQL measure suitable for UK use in healthy children, children with chronic disease conditions and socially disadvantaged children.Patients:A total of 1238 children took part in the study, including healthy children as controls (n = 824) and five exemplar groups: children diagnosed with asthma (n = 87), diabetes (n = 103) or inflammatory bowel disease (IBD; n = 69), children in remission from cancer (n = 68) and children in public care (n = 87).Methods:In phase I, the Manchester-Minneapolis Quality of Life instrument (MMQL) Child Form was translated into UK English. In phases II and III, the questionnaire was shortened and validated.Results:MMQL was anglicised and shortened to five components comprising 29 items. Good internal reliability was found with α reaching at least 0.69 for all subscales. Construct validity was established through moderate correlations with comparable PedsQL subscales (Pearson’s r ranged from 0.38 to 0.58, p<0.01). Discriminant validity was also demonstrated in children with asthma and IBD, children in remission from cancer and children in public care, all of whom reported significantly lower HRQL than healthy children. Children with diabetes showed similar HRQL to their healthy peers. Good reproducibility and moderate responsiveness were demonstrated for the new measure.Conclusions:The anglicised and shortened MMQL was shown to be valid and reliable and could be a valuable new tool for the assessment of HRQL in children.