Psychometric Evaluation of the Chinese Version of the Quality-of-Life Questionnaire for Patients with Multiple Myeloma

Background: Patients with multiple myeloma (MM) frequently endure a range of disease-related and treatment-related symptoms that significantly impact their quality of life. The Quality of Life Questionnaire Multiple Myeloma Module 20-item (QLQ-MY20) questionnaire developed by European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) was to evaluate the quality of life in patients with myeloma. However, it had not been evaluated in China. This study aimed to validate the Chinese version of the EORTC QLQ-MY20 questionnaire in terms of its reliability, validity, and sensitivity.Methods: The EORTC QLQ-MY20 questionnaire was translated into Chinese and was completed by 140 Chinese patients with MM. The analysis included assessing content validity using the scale-level content validity index, evaluating construct validity through exploratory factor analysis, and calculating reliability statistics.Results: The scale-level content validity index/unanimity was 0.875, and the scale-level content validity index/average was 0.915. Through exploratory factor analysis, the Chinese version of QLQ-MY20 demonstrated a test-retest reliability of 0.857. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.887, with the three dimensions having coefficients of 0.879, 0.809, and 0.786, respectively. The Kaiser-Meyer-Oklin value was 0.927, and the eigenvalues for the three common factors were 10.127, 2.831, and 1.124, respectively. The overall variance contribution rate was 74.112%.Conclusions: The Chinese edition of the EORTC QLQ-MY20 is deemed a reliable and valid instrument for evaluating the quality of life in Chinese patients with MM.