WHOQOL-Hindi: a questionnaire for assessing quality of life in health care settings in India. World Health Organization Quality of Life.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Quality of life is becoming an important component of overall assessment in health care settings. However, satisfactory instruments are not available for use in India. METHODS: Qualitative and quantitative work was conducted at the Delhi centre as a part of the WHOQOL (World Health Organization Quality of Life) project at 15 centres in developing and developed countries to construct a new quality of life instrument (WHOQOL). The pilot field trial at Delhi was conducted on 304 adult subjects using the 236-item questionnaire. RESULTS: Based on the pilot field trial data, item reduction could be done to develop a 100-item version (WHOQOL-100, Hindi). The items are distributed into 4 domains (physical; psychological, social and environmental health) and 25 facets. Each facet has four items, rated on a five-point scale. The initial psychometric properties of this instrument are satisfactory. A 26-item short version has also been developed (WHOQOL-Bref, Hindi). CONCLUSION: The WHOQOL-100, Hindi appears to be a suitable instrument for comprehensively assessing quality of life in health care settings. WHOQOL-Bref, Hindi can be used for intervention studies including drug trials.