Renata Virginia González-Consuegra

Quality of life in people with venous leg ulcers: an integrative review.

OBJECTIVE To explore the impact of venous leg ulcers on health-related quality of life and analyse the quality of life instruments that have been used for this topic. BACKGROUND Venous leg ulcers represent more than 80% of all chronic leg ulcers. Several studies have demonstrated that health-related quality of life is affected in patients with such lesions. METHOD An integrative review was conducted, together with an additional methodological review of quality of life instruments. Eight electronic databases were searched, and all studies published between 2003 and 2008 were considered in with both qualitative and quantitative approaches and in Spanish, English, French, German and Portuguese. Thus, no restrictions were applied as regards study design. RESULTS Twenty-two studies were included; one used mixed methods, three employed qualitative methods and the remaining articles used a quantitative approach. Pain was the factor most frequently identified as affecting health-related quality of life. The generic instruments most commonly used were Short Form-36 and adaptations, the Nottingham Health Profile and EuroQol-5, whilst the disease-specific tools were Hyland, Cardiff Wound Impact Schedule and Charing Cross Venous Leg Ulcer Questionnaire. Two new instruments were also identified, venous leg ulcer quality of life and Sheffield Preference-based Venous Leg Ulcer 5D. CONCLUSIONS The negative impact of venous leg ulcers on health-related quality of life is confirmed in this review. This impact has been measured using a variety of specific health-related quality of life instruments. However, the review findings suggest that the Charing Cross Venous Leg Ulcer Questionnaire is the most appropriate instrument due to its disease-specific psychometric characteristics.

Proceso de adaptación al castellano del Charing Cross Venous Ulcer Questionnaire (CCVUQ) para medir la calidad de vida relacionada con la salud en pacientes con úlceras venosas

Introduccion: la medicion de la calidad de vida relacionada con la salud (CVRS) permite, en gran medida, contribuir a mejorar la calidad del cuidado. Se ha constatado que la CVRS de las personas con ulceras venosas (UV) esta afectada negativamente. Los instrumentos especificos que miden CVRS en estas personas no estan disponibles en castellano. Por tanto, se hace necesario disponer de algun instrumento de este tipo adaptado y validado en este idioma. El objetivo de este estudio es la adaptacion transcultural al castellano de uno de estos instrumentos, en concreto el Charing Cross Venous Ulcer Questionnaire (CCVUQ). Material y metodo: la version original del cuestionario CCVUQ, que incluye 20 preguntas, se ha adaptado al castellano siguiendo la metodologia de traduccion y retrotraduccion y el establecimiento de equivalencias semanticas culturales. En el proceso de adaptacion han participado un grupo de expertos en heridas cronicas y un grupo de pacientes con estas lesiones. Resultados: se obtuvo una version satisfactoria del cuestionario CCVUQ traducida y adaptada culturalmente a Espana, con la realizacion de ajustes considerados menores a las preguntas originales, pero necesarios para la comprension de la poblacion local, a fin de guardar la equivalencia semantica y conceptual de la version original. Discusion y conclusiones: la version espanola del CCVUQ es semantica y culturalmente equivalente a la version original inglesa. Es un instrumento con preguntas sencillas que durante el proceso sufrio modificaciones a partir de los aportes y las sugerencias de expertos y de los pacientes, que no afecto a su esencia, y que ha permitido contar con una version pre-test adecuada, adaptada al idioma espanol y a la cultura espanola. En una fase posterior, se llevara a cabo una investigacion con el fin de validar y testar las propiedades psicometricas del instrumento adaptado al espanol.