Two acne-related quality of life measurement tools recommended for use in clinical studies
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After analyzing multiple patient-reported outcome measures for health-related quality of life regarding acne, researchers recommended the Acne-Q and CompAQ for use in clinical studies.
“Patient-reported outcomes provide complementary information to clinical outcomes and are a valuable tool to ensure we are capturing the patient’s perspective in both routine clinical care and clinical trials,” John Barbieri, MD, MBA, director of the Advanced Acne Therapeutics Clinic at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, in Boston, told Healio.
“Understanding the patient's perspective is critical to individualize treatment recommendations to each patient's unique lived experience. In addition, patient-reported outcomes are preferred by patients in clinical trials,” Barbieri continued. “While many patient-reported outcomes are available to assess health-related quality of life in patients with acne, little is known about which ones perform best.”
To examine which health-related quality of life (HRQoL) patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) are the most appropriate for acne research and clinical practice, Barbieri and colleagues performed a systematic literature search. They identified 54 reports that met inclusion criteria.
They further identified 10 acne-specific PROMs, all of which were multi-item instruments and included adolescents and adults as a target audience. Determination of acne-related HRQoL was mostly related to emotional functioning, physical functioning and social functioning domains. In addition, they analyzed six dermatology-specific PROMs that have been assessed in acne care.
Among acne-specific PROMs, the researchers rated overall development for the Acne-Q as adequate and the overall content validity of the Acne-Q and the CompAQ as moderate. They rated the Acne Impact on Adult Daily Life, the Acne Quality of Life Scale, the Acne Quality of Life Index, the Acne Disability Index and the Cardiff Acne Disability Index as inadequate. They rated the remaining acne-specific PROMs as doubtful.
In their conclusive scoring, Barbieri and colleagues gave the Acne-Q and CompAQ a “grade A” and the rest of the analyzed PROMs a “grade B.” None of the analyzed PROMs received a “grade C,” which would require high quality evidence of insufficient measurement criteria.
They wrote that all acne-specific instruments had high enough evidence of internal consistency except the Assessment of the Psychological and Social Effects of Acne, “where this evidence was only assessed in a conference abstract that did not meet inclusion criteria for this review.”
Finally, they noted that the Acne Quality of Life and the Acne Severity and Impact Scale PROMs could be considered if additional evaluation of content validity is performed.
“Incorporating patient-reported outcomes into everyday practice can help us ensure that we are capturing the patient’s voice,” Barbieri said.
According to Barbieri, patient-reported outcomes “help invite patients to discuss their lived experience,” and this can impact shared decision making and improve treatment suggestions.
“In addition, as patient-reported outcomes can be completed asynchronously before the visit, they can save time as well in a busy clinical setting. Patient-reported outcomes can enable robust and objective tracking of outcomes over time, which can facilitate research using real-world clinical data,” Barbieri said.