Preliminary Validation of the HS-QoL: A Quality-of-Life Measure for Hidradenitis Suppurativa

BACKGROUND: Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is a chronic inflammatory skin disease with adverse physical and psychosocial impacts. The development of an HS quality-of-life measure, HS-QoL, has been recently described. OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to validate the HS-QoL. METHOD: Fifty-five patients with HS from 4 dermatology clinics completed the 30-minute online survey. Item reduction, reliability (internal consistency), and correlation analysis (to assess convergent validity) were conducted. RESULTS: The HS-QoL was reduced from 53 items to 44 items, resulting in a 7-subscale questionnaire. All subscales demonstrated excellent internal consistency, except for the support subscale, which had adequate internal consistency. All 7 HS-QoL subscales were related to other measures of QoL, life satisfaction, and mental health, which demonstrates convergent validity. CONCLUSION: The 44-item HS-QoL demonstrated strong preliminary evidence of reliability (internal consistency) and convergent validity.