University of Sussex
Browse

File(s) not publicly available

Differing views of children and parents: some cautionary tales!

journal contribution
posted on 2023-06-08, 12:13 authored by Helen Smith
Both in medical research and clinical practice, traditional outcome measures, such as reduction of symptoms or days off work, are increasingly being augmented by quality-of-life (QOL) assessment. Within health care, QOL is determined not only by the patient's health status problems but also by their response and interpretation of the restrictions, and various instruments have been developed to measure this, both cross-sectionally and over time. Over the last 15 years, there has been increasing interest in QOL in children. As in adults, researchers have identified three distinct QOL perspectives; generic, health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and disease-specific quality of life (DSQOL). Generic measures of QOL can be used with both ill and healthy children. HRQOL focuses on health status and the individual's response to problems in health status. As such, the concept of HRQOL refers to the part of QOL that is primarily influenced by health status. DSQOL measurements assess changes in functioning and patients' sense of well-being in relation to a particular illness. Because QOL is concerned with an individual's perceptions, self-reported questionnaires are the primary method of assessment. Early work assumed that children are unreliable respondents and lack the reading, linguistic and cognitive skills necessary to respond to QOL measurements [1]. Further justification for the use of parents as proxy reporters was claimed as it was recognized that parents act as the primary health-care provider and as the gatekeepers to paediatric health care.

History

Publication status

  • Published

Journal

Clinical & Experimental Allergy

ISSN

0954-7894

Publisher

Wiley-Blackwell

Issue

10

Volume

41

Page range

1344-1345

Department affiliated with

  • Primary Care and Public Health Publications

Full text available

  • No

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2012-08-09

Usage metrics

    University of Sussex (Publications)

    Categories

    No categories selected

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC