title: An assessment of the external validity of mapping QLQ-C30 to EQ-5D preferences.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Although cancer-specific Health-related Quality-of-Life measures are commonly included in randomized clinical trials or other prospective non-randomized clinical studies, it is rare that preference-based instruments are used, which allow the calculation of a Utility weight suitable for estimating Quality-adjusted Life-Years gained.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To test the external validity of a previously published mapping algorithm to transform the EORTC QLQ-C30 questionnaire responses into EQ-5D-derived utilities by predicting EQ-5D utilities from QLQ-C30 scores.
  
  
  METHODS
  Comparative retrospective data analysis of four multicentre, prospective clinical trials in Breast, Multiple Myeloma, Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and Non-Small-Cell Lung cancer patients with, respectively, 219, 172, 132 and 172 patients. Regression analysis of individual pairs of EQ-5D and QLQ-C30 scores.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Although the internal predictive power of a previously published mapping equation was high, its external validity when tested on a set of unrelated external data sets in other cancers proved to underestimate both the mean and variance of the mapped EQ-5D utilities. Furthermore, it appears that the relationship between QLQ-C30 scores and EQ-5D values is not stable across the different data sets.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Validation of the proposed algorithm in other external clinical data sets should be encouraged as well as the application of other more complex mapping methods to enhance accuracy of mapping. In the meanwhile, direct mapping from QLQ-C30 profiles to EQ-5D utilities using published algorithms should be performed with reservations.
authors: Institute for Medical Technology Assessment, Erasmus University Rotterdam, J-building—Campus Woudestein, PO Box 1738, 3000 DR Rotterdam, The Netherlands. rcrott@hotmail.co.uk
authors: Ralph
authors: R
authors: Crott
authors: Matthijs
authors: M
authors: Versteegh
authors: Carin
authors: C
authors: Uyl-de-Groot
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000465:Algorithms; D000970:Antineoplastic Agents / Q000191:economics / Q000627:therapeutic use; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000191:economics / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D009426:Netherlands; D017060:Patient Satisfaction / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D011788:Quality of Life; D019057:Quality-Adjusted Life Years; D012044:Regression Analysis; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
chemical_list: D000970:Antineoplastic Agents