Measurement of Health-Related Quality of Life in Chronic Heart Failure, from a Nursing Perspective—a Review of the Literature

BACKGROUND: Living with chronic heart failure (CHF) is distressful and affects daily life. Because of the lack of a cure for CHF, there has been a progressive interest in using health-related quality of life (Hr-QoL) as an outcome measurement of the treatment in patients with CHF. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this review was to describe the instruments/questionnaires used in different studies in the measurement of Hr-QoL in patients with CHF, and how they were put into operation as seen from a nursing perspective. METHOD: MEDLINE and CINAHL databases were searched from January 1995 to June 2002, by using the keywords CHF, heart failure, QoL and Hr-QoL. A total of 33 articles were analysed. RESULTS: Thirty-two different Hr-QoL questionnaires were found. Generic, disease-specific and battery approaches were different ways used to measure Hr-QoL. To assess/describe Hr-QoL, evaluate the impact of interventions and examine relations/predictors were three main objectives. However, different aspects of the concept Hr-QoL, influencing factors, how to implement the questionnaires and a lack of unified CHF criteria existed. CONCLUSIONS: To create a guideline for the measurement of Hr-QoL in CHF patients is of great importance for nurses and might generate homogeneity in the measurement methods and promote the scientific approach in the nursing care process.