• Developed as a condition-specific quality of life measure for individuals with SCI who have urinary disorders that could be used in international multi-centre trials.
  • Developed by a multi-disciplinary group of experts and the questions were derived based on the literature and individuals with SCI.
  • Contains 4 domains:

1) Limitations / Inconvenience (items 1-9)
2) Constraints / Restrictions (items 10-17)
3) Fears (items 18-25)
4) Feelings / Impact on Daily Life (items 26-30)

Clinical Considerations

The Qualiveen was developed specifically for individuals with SCI and was developed with input from individuals with SCI.

ICF Domain

Quality of Life

Administration

  • Can be administered by interviewer or be self-administered.
  • The questionnaire is based on a 5 point Likert scale.
  • Administration time is under 30 minutes.

Number of Items

30

Equipment

 None

Scoring

  • Each domain score is calculated as an average of the scores for the domain items.
  • An overall (averaged) score can also be calculated.

Languages

English, French, Dutch, German, Turkish, Persian, Greek, Polish, and Italian.

Training Required

Does not require advanced training.

Availability

Can be purchased here.

Information for the Qualiveen-30 can be found here.

Measurement Property Summary

# of studies reporting psychometric properties: 2

Interpretability

  • Each of the four scales are scored from 0 – 100, where lower scores indicate a better quality of life (i.e. no limitations, fears, constraints, or negative feelings) and higher scores indicate a poorer quality of life.
  • Data is only provided from one study, so no normative data exists for the SCI population.
  • Reference scores for different gender, age and type of lesion are available from the Qualiveen manual on 400 individuals with SCI (see the Interpretability section of the Study Details page).

MCID: not established in SCI
SEM: not established in SCI
MDC: not established in SCI

Reliability

  • Internal consistency is High for the total Qualiveen scale (Cronbach’s a = 0.80) as well as for all the Qualiveen subscales (Cronbach’s a = 0.81-0.85).
  • Test-retest reliability is High for the 4 Qualiveen subscales (ICC = 0.85-0.92).

(Costa et al. 2001)

Validity

  • As expected, correlations of Qualiveen subscales to overall Qualiveen are positive and:
    • Moderate to High for Qualiveen-Limitations (Pearson’s r = 0.52-0.65)
    • Moderate to High for Qualiveen-Constraints (Pearson’s r = 0.43-0.66)
    • Moderate to High for Qualiveen-Fears (Pearson’s r = 0.39-0.60)
    • Moderate to High for Qualiveen-Feelings (Pearson’s r = 0.50-0.77).
  • Correlations between items in each domain and non-corresponding domains are Low to High for Qualiveen-Limitations (Pearson’s r = 0.29-0.64), and Low to Moderate for Qualiveen-Constraints (Pearson’s r = 0.18-0.59), Qualiveen-Fears (Pearson’s r = 0.12-0.40) and Qualiveen-Feelings (Pearson’s r = 0.28-0.57).

(Costa et al. 2001)

Responsiveness

No values were reported for the responsiveness of the Qualiveen scale for the SCI population at this time.

Floor/Ceiling Effect

Floor and ceiling effects were minimal for the Qualiveen scale.

(Costa et al. 2001)

Reviewers

Dr. Bill Miller, Dr. Carlos Cano-Herrera

Date Last Updated

31 December 2024

Costa P, Perrouin-Verbe B, Colvez A, Didier J, Marquis P, Marrel A, Amarenco G, Espirac B, Leriche A. Quality of life in spinal cord injury patients with urinary difficulties. Development and validation of qualiveen. Eur Urol 2001;39:107-113.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11173948

Nikfallah A, Rezaali S, Mohammadi N, et al. Translation, Cultural Adaptation and Validation of the Qualiveen-30 Questionnaire in Persian for Patients with Spinal Cord Injury and Multiple Sclerosis. Low Urin Tract Symptoms. 2015;7(1):42-9.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26663651

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