Health and Quality of Life Outcomes BioMed Central Commentary Open Access A brief guide to the selection of quality of life instrument Michael E Hyland* Address: Department of Psychology, University of Plymouth, Plymouth PL4 8AA Email: Michael E Hyland* - * Corresponding author Published: 03 July 2003 Health and Quality of Life Outcomes 2003, 1:24 This article is available from: Received: 19 June 2003 Accepted: 03 July 2003 © 2003 Hyland; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article: verbatim copying and redistribution of this article are permitted in all media for any purpose, provided this notice is preserved along with the article's original URL. Abstract There. | BioMed Central Health and Quality of Life Outcomes Commentary A brief guide to the selection of quality of life instrument Michael E Hyland Open Access Address Department of Psychology University of Plymouth Plymouth PL4 8AA Email Michael E Hyland - Corresponding author Published 03 July 2003 Received 19 June 2003 Accepted 03 July 2003 Health and Quality of Life Outcomes 2003 1 24 This article is available from http content 1 1 24 2003 Hyland licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article verbatim copying and redistribution of this article are permitted in all media for any purpose provided this notice is preserved along with the article s original URL. Abstract There are numerous quality of life QOL scales. Because QOL experts are often partial to their own scales researchers need to be able to select scales for themselves. Scales best suited for longitudinal purposes clinical trials and audit have different properties to those suited for crosssectional studies population and correlational studies and clinical use . The reason and logic of these differences is explained. For longitudinal use researchers need to consider the relationship between item set population and treatment scales can be short floor and ceiling effects must be avoided and there should be extended response options. For cross-sectional use scales should have a wide range of items should be longer and there are no adverse floor and ceiling effects and response options can be simpler to allow a larger set of items. Introduction There are numerous quality of life QOL instruments available to researchers but little guidance for selection between them 1 . This choice is made more difficult by the fact that experts are frequently partial to their own scales 2 . Although researchers may feel daunted by the need to choose for themselves this task is surprisingly straightforward once the rules underlying QOL scale performance are understood. The purpose .
