[Reliability of caregivers in assessing the quality of life of stroke survivors: an explorative study].
Reliability of caregivers in assessing the quality of life of stroke survivors: an explorative study. Introduction. Not all stroke survivors are able to assess their quality of life (QOL), thus a caregiver could provide important information on patients' QOL.


OBJECTIVE
To assess caregiver's reliability in measuring QOL in stroke survivors.


METHODS
Fifty (50) patient-caregiver dyads were recruited. Patients, hospitalized in rehabilitation facilities, were administered the Stroke Impact Scale 3.0 (SIS 3.0) patient version, the Barthel Index, the Modified Rankin Scale, and the National Institute of Health Stroke Scale. Caregivers completed the SIS 3.0 proxy version.


RESULTS
The mean scores of the SIS 3.0 patient version were very similar to the proxy version and ranged from 19.1 vs 16.2 for the Hand function domain to 83.81 vs 81.85 for the Communication domain. Caregivers tended to underestimate patients' QOL although scores were not significantly different. Intraclass correlations between the patient version and the proxy version of the SIS 3.0 were highly significant (p<0.001), with coefficient over 0.80. Lower coefficients were observed for the Social participation (0.58), Emotion (0.64) and Communication (0.79) domains.


CONCLUSIONS
Caregivers were more reliable in assessing the physical rather than psychosocial domains.
Universita degli Studi Tor Vergata, Roma.
Ercole
E
Vellone
Serenella
S
Savini
Silvio
S
Simeone
Nicola
N
Barbato
Giuseppina
G
Castrovillano
Maria Donatella
MD
Caramia
Rosaria
R
Alvaro
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D017028:Caregivers; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019727:Proxy; D011788:Quality of Life; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D020521:Stroke