TY - JOUR T1 - Health-related quality of life in pediatric minor injury: Reliability, validity, and responsiveness of the pediatric quality of life inventory in the emergency department AU - Stevens MW, Hainsworth KR, Weisman SJ, Layde PM Y1 - 2012/01/01 N1 - 10.1001/archpediatrics.2011.694 JO - Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine SP - 74 EP - 81 VL - 166 IS - 1 N2 - Objective  To evaluate the feasibility, reliability, validity, and responsiveness of the Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory 4.0 Generic Core Scales (PedsQL) in the first 2 weeks after pediatric emergency department care of minor injury.Design  Prospective cohort study.Setting  Pediatric hospital emergency department.Participants  Children and adolescents with minor injury (n = 334).Main Outcome Measures  Child- and parent-reported clinical outcomes and PedsQL scale scores.Results  The PedsQL had good to excellent internal consistency reliability (α range, 0.73-0.93). For each day that the clinical symptoms persisted, there were consistent decreases in mean health-related quality of life (HRQOL) scores (validity testing). There were significantly greater negative changes in mean HRQOL scores for fractures vs soft-tissue injuries and for lower vs upper extremity injuries. Clinical outcomes categorized as poor had large negative changes in HRQOL not seen in good outcome groups. Distribution-based indicators of change supported good responsiveness (effect sizes for the physical summary score, 0.01-2.44; group differences at follow-up exceeded estimates of the minimal importance difference).Conclusions  The PedsQL is feasible, reliable, and demonstrates good construct and discriminant validity and responsiveness in measuring short-term outcome after minor injury care in the pediatric emergency department. Assessing short-term outcome from the patient perspective with HRQOL measures may greatly enhance our ability to evaluate the effectiveness of emergency department care. SN - 1072-4710 M3 - doi: 10.1001/archpediatrics.2011.694 UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/archpediatrics.2011.694 ER -