Developing a quality of life instrument in patients with psoriasis: the Psoriasis Quality of Life Questionnaire (PQLQ).
METHODS
Psoriasis is a chronic skin disease which causes psychological, social and physical problems and affects quality of life. The aim of this study was to develop a quality of life instrument for patients with psoriasis which is suitable for Islamic populations.


METHODS
The psychosocial and daily life problems defined by 75 patients with psoriasis, their relatives and physicians were used to construct a questionnaire, the reliability and validity of which were determined in a group of 156 patients with psoriasis.


RESULTS
For reliability, Chronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.87, and item-total correlations were between 0.37 and 0.60 for internal consistency. There was high test-retest reliability (r = 0.98, P < 0.001). For validity, three factors were extracted in the principal components method for construct validity. The maximum factor loadings of each item were between 0.456 and 0.681. For convergent validity, all patients' self-ratings and Psoriasis Area and Severity Index (PASI) were correlated with the questionnaire score (P < 0.001).


CONCLUSIONS
The questionnaire consisting of 17 items was found to be suitable for both epidemiologic and clinical trials.
Inanir
Işil
I
Department of Dermatology, Celal Bayar University, Manisa, Turkey. isilinanir@hotmail.com
Aydemir
Omer
O
Gündüz
Kamer
K
Danaci
Ayşen Esen
AE
Türel
Aylin
A
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006305:Health Status Indicators; D006801:Humans; D007514:Islam; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011565:Psoriasis / Q000523:psychology; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013315:Stress, Psychological; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014421:Turkey / Q000208:ethnology