Ofenloch Robert F, Oosterhaven Jart A F, Susitaival Päivikki, Svensson Åke, Weisshaar Elke, Minamoto Keiko, Onder Meltem, Schuttelaar Marie Louise A, Bulbul Baskan Emel, Diepgen Thomas L, Apfelbacher Christian
Department of Clinical and Social Medicine, University Hospital Heidelberg, Germany.
Department of Dermatology, University Medical Center Groningen, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.
J Invest Dermatol. 2017 Jul;137(7):1454-1460. doi: 10.1016/j.jid.2017.02.969. Epub 2017 Mar 1.
The Quality of Life in Hand Eczema Questionnaire (QOLHEQ) is the only instrument assessing disease-specific health-related quality of life in patients with hand eczema. It is available in eight language versions. In this study we assessed if the items of different language versions of the QOLHEQ yield comparable values across countries. An international multicenter study was conducted with participating centers in Finland, Germany, Japan, The Netherlands, Sweden, and Turkey. Methods of item response theory were applied to each subscale to assess differential item functioning for items among countries. Overall, 662 hand eczema patients were recruited into the study. Single items were removed or split according to the item response theory model by country to resolve differential item functioning. After this adjustment, none of the four subscales of the QOLHEQ showed significant misfit to the item response theory model (P < 0.01), and a Person Separation Index of greater than 0.7 showed good internal consistency for each subscale. By adapting the scoring of the QOLHEQ using the methods of item response theory, it was possible to obtain QOLHEQ values that are comparable across countries. Cross-cultural variations in the interpretation of single items were resolved. The QOLHEQ is now ready to be used in international studies assessing the health-related quality of life impact of hand eczema.
手部湿疹生活质量问卷（QOLHEQ）是唯一一项评估手部湿疹患者特定疾病健康相关生活质量的工具。它有八种语言版本。在本研究中，我们评估了QOLHEQ不同语言版本的条目在不同国家是否能产生可比的值。开展了一项国际多中心研究，参与中心包括芬兰、德国、日本、荷兰、瑞典和土耳其。对每个分量表应用项目反应理论方法，以评估各国项目之间的差异项目功能。总体而言，662名手部湿疹患者被纳入研究。根据项目反应理论模型，按国家对单个条目进行删除或拆分，以解决差异项目功能问题。经过此调整后，QOLHEQ的四个分量表均未显示出与项目反应理论模型存在显著失配（P<0.01），且每个分量表的个人分离指数大于0.7表明具有良好的内部一致性。通过使用项目反应理论方法调整QOLHEQ的评分，有可能获得不同国家间可比的QOLHEQ值。解决了单个条目的跨文化解释差异问题。QOLHEQ现已准备好用于评估手部湿疹对健康相关生活质量影响的国际研究。
