Methodological Principles for the Development of a Questionnaire “Quality of Life” in Patients with Computer Visual Syndrome

Abstract

Purpose: scientific substantiation and development of methodological principles of the “quality of life” (QOL) assessment questionnaire in patients with symptoms of computer visual syndrome (CVS).Material and мethods. As part of the first stage of the study, an individual interview was carried out (according to the standard developed methodology) with 100 patients with visually strenuous labor, according to the results of which the entire spectrum of complaints arising during prolonged work with a computer was determined (44 complaints in total). As part of the second stage, a special questionnaire was developed, in which the identified complaints were transformed into questions. The study involved 96 ophthalmologists aged 32 to 62 years with an average of 17.3 ± 1.4 years. The task of an expert ophthalmologist was to assess the relevance each of the questions in terms of the influence degree on the patient’s QOL, as well as the “severity” of the complaint in terms the of occurrence frequency.Results. The development of the questionnaire was based on the sequential implementation of five stages (development of a conceptual framework; development of a preliminary version and confirmation of validity content; additional modification; scaling procedure development; psychometric properties determination). The results obtained made it possible to form the questionnaire (22 questions) the final version, which (according to the analysis) meets the requirements of meaningful and constructive validity (specificity, reflection of questions and scales of significance for the patient, the results of an expert assessment by ophthalmologists of the psychometric response scale) with the weight coefficients development, the required values correlation coefficients (according to Pearson) between the relevance assessment of the question from the points according to the symptom severity, as well as the high level of consistency according to the “Cronbach-α” indicator.Conclusion. The main direction of the assessment QOL improving of a patient with GLC is active participation in the ophthalmologist’s questionnaire development. Our results determine that the expert assessment provides a mathematically confirmed choice of the most significant (in terms on QoL impact) subjective manifestations, which (in conjunction with the development of each patient’s possible responses expert assessments, in points) provides the required level of the questionnaire meaningful and constructive validity. The developed questionnaire can be recommended for further clinical testing.