Quality of life measurement instruments for headache and migraine disorders

Abstract

Introduction: The present study aims to achieve a comprehensive review of existing patient-reported outcome measurement instruments (PROMs) used for assessing the impact of headache disorders and migraine on patients health-related quality of life. Materials and Methods: We conducted a systematic search of published literature in PubMed, Medline electronic databases and specific journals. Literature search was supplemented by a manual search of retrieved articles, performed to identify additional relevant articles about the topic. We also used Mendeley, Google Scholar and ResearchGate to access any other sources and full text versions of articles. Results: The quality of life measurement instruments identified after the literature review are: MSQ (Migraine-Specific Quality of Life Questionnaire), SF (Short-Form Health Survey), HUI (Health Utilities Index), EQ-5D (EuroQol-5 Dimensions). Articles which are based on real data from clinical practice and are using patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs), were considered to synthesize different real-word practices/approaches/patterns/results used by researchers in the context of quality of life of patients with headache and migraine disorders. Conclusion: Quality of life related PROMs in paper format and especially their electronic version are valuable instruments that facilitate and improve data collection and patient use (less data entry errors, complete and accurate data, easy to administrate/management). Their multiple advantages and their integration into EHRs are also discussed.