Development of a Quality of Life Scale For Children on Chronic Peritoneal Dialysis

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to develop a quality of life scale for children on chronic peritoneal dialysis(QOL-CPD). METHODS: Thirty children on chronic PD at Seoul National University Children's Hospital participated. A healthy control group included 47 elementary school children. Other patients groups are 32 children from the department of pediatric orthopedics and 28 children from the department of child psychiatry. The age range of all children was 7 to 16 years. Preliminary items of the QOL-CPD were developed and administered along with the Korean version of the Children's Depression Inventory(CDI) to all children. RESULTS: The final QOL-CPD was constructed by excluding those items with a factor loading of less than .20, and the principal axis factor analysis was performed again. The QOL-CPD demonstrated a good internal consistency with a value of .87. The dialysis and child-psychiatric groups showed significantly lower QOL scores compared to the healthy control group. In addition, the dialysis and child-psychiatric groups showed greater difficulties on physical and academic functions. For the CDI, the PD group showed a mild level of depression. CONCLUSION: The results of this study demonstrate the clinical utility of a newly developed self-report QOL scale specific for children on chronic PD.