Abstract
Purpose
To study the validity and reliability of the Malay version of the Specific Thalassemia Quality of Life Instrument (STQOLI) in Sabah’s adult thalassemia patients.
Patients and methods
This cross-sectional study was done at Thalassemia Treatment Centre, Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Sabah, Malaysia. Eighty-two adult thalassemia patients who fulfilled the inclusion and exclusion criteria were conveniently selected for participation in the study. The English version of STQOLI was translated into Malay by using forward and back translations. The content of the questionnaire was validated by the chief hematologist of the hospital. The construct validity of the 40-item questionnaire was assessed by principal component analysis with varimax rotation and the scale reliability was assessed by Cronbach’s alpha.
Results
The study failed to replicate the internal structure of the Greek STQOLI. Instead, 12 factors have been identified from the exploratory factor analysis, which accounted for 72.2% of the variance. However, only eight factors were interpretable. The factors were iron chelation pump impact, transfusion impact, time spent on treatment and its impact on work and social life, sex life, side effects of treatment, cardiovascular problems, psychology, and iron chelation pill impact. The overall scale reliability was 0.913.
Conclusion
This study was unable to replicate the internal structure of the Greek STQOLI in Sabah’s adult thalassemia patients. Instead, a new structure has emerged that can be used as a guide to develop a questionnaire specific for adult thalassemia patients in Sabah. Future research should focus on the eight factors identified from this study.
Acknowledgments
We would like to thank Dr Georgios Lyrakos from the Lyrakos G. Psychometrics and Research, Greece for the permission to use the STQOLI in this study. We would also like to thank the Director General of Health Malaysia for permission to publish the results of this study.
Author contributions
All authors contributed toward data analysis, drafting and critically revising the paper and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.
Disclosure
The authors report no conflicts of interest in this work.