A systematic review of quality of thyroid-specific health-related quality of life instruments recommends ThyPRO for patients with benign thyroid diseases

Abstract

Objective: To appraise the measurement properties of thyroid-specific health-related quality of life (HRQOL) instruments, and to provide recommendations on the choice of HRQOL instruments. Study Design and Setting: Systematic review of English-language literature published between 1993 and 2015 identified psychometric studies involving patients with thyroid disease through a search of Pubmed, Web of Science, Embase, and OVID Medline. HRQOL instruments were graded on methodological quality and overall levels of evidence using a COSMIN checklist. Results: After a review of 743 original studies, 23 studies reporting 14 standardized HRQOL instruments targeted for Graves’ ophthalmopathy (n=4), hypothyroidism (n=3), thyroid cancer (n=2), other thyroid disease (n=3) and non-thyroid tumor sites (n=2) were identified. Hypothesis testing was evaluated most frequently. The 84-item thyroid-specific patient-reported outcome measure (ThyPRO) and 16-item Graves' ophthalmopathy specific Quality of Life (GO-QOL) instruments were the most extensively evaluated instrument. The highest number of positive ratings in overall level of psychometric evidence was found in ThyPRO, GO-QOL and 11-item Thyroid Treatment Satisfaction Questionnaire (ThyTSQ) instruments. Conclusions: The ThyPRO is recommended for the assessment of HRQOL in patients with benign thyroid diseases whilst measurement properties of GO-QOL and ThyTSQ are satisfactory in measuring HRQOL of patients with Graves’ ophthalmopathy and hypothyroidism, respectively.