Validation of the simplified Chinese version of the quality of life instrument EORTC QLQ-LC43 for patients with lung cancer.

PURPOSE: To validate the simplified Chinese version of the EORTC QLQ-LC43 for lung cancer patients.

METHODS: The simplified Chinese version of the QLQ-LC43 was used to measure quality of life (QOL) of 181 in-patients with lung cancer at three time points before and after treatment. Psychometric properties of the instrument were evaluated based on the QOL data collected from the patients using correlation analysis, factor analysis and paired t-test.

RESULTS: The test-retest reliability r for most domains was higher than 0.60 with a range from 0.53 to 0.80. The internal consistency alpha for all domains was higher than 0.65 except for cognitive functioning (0.32). Correlation analysis and factor analysis demonstrated good construct validity. The instrument reflected the differences in QOL scores among different age groups, indicating known-groups validity, and revealed good criterion-related validity when FACT-L was used as the criterion. The instrument detected changes of QOL with higher standardized response mean for the patients before and after treatment.

CONCLUSION: The Chinese version of QLQ-LC43 can be used to measure QOL for Chinese patients with lung cancer with good validity, reliability and responsiveness.