Minimal important differences and response shift in health-related quality of life; a longitudinal study in patients with multiple myeloma

Table 2 EORTC QLQ-C30 scores for the pre-, post- and then-test

	n	Pre-test (T1), mean (SD)	p ^α	Post-test (T2), mean (SD)	p ^β	Then-test, mean (SD)
Pain*
improved	58	52.6 (32.7)	< 0.01	37.9 (27.5)	< 0.01	55.5 (24.5)
unchanged	126	28.7 (27.8)	0.29	27.6 (28.0)	< 0.01	22.5 (26.1)
deteriorated	50	46.0 (27.7)	< 0.01	63.3 (28.6)	< 0.01	36.3 (31.0)
Fatigue*
improved	56	51.0 (22.9)	< 0.01	37.5 (21.4)	< 0.01	51.4 (23.3)
unchanged	119	40.4 (24.6)	0.17	38.7 (26.1)	< 0.01	34.2 (25.4)
deteriorated	58	56.3 (25.3)	0.01	64.0 (23.7)	< 0.01	43.5 (25.3)
Physical function ^†
improved	73	59.9 (22.3)	< 0.01	66.3 (20.4)	< 0.01	57.5 (24.2)
unchanged	96	69.7 (21.9)	0.77	70.4 (21.5)	0.15	71.7 (22.7)
deteriorated	58	60.8 (22.6)	< 0.01	48.1 (21.2)	< 0.01	68.3 (21.9)
Quality of life ^†
improved	79	59.0 (26.1)	< 0.01	66.6 (21.0)	< 0.01	51.9 (19.5)
unchanged	110	64.2 (22.1)	0.69	64.5 (21.5)	0.44	63.2 (20.1)
deteriorated	49	48.6 (20.9)	< 0.01	36.6 (20.2)	< 0.01	48.8 (16.0)

*For the symptom scales pain and fatigue, higher scores represent more symptoms or difficulties
^† For the physical function and global quality of life scales, higher scores mean better functioning
SD: Standard deviation
p^α -values denote differences between scale-means at T1 and T2
p^β -values denote differences between scale-means at T2 and then-test

ISSN: 1477-7525