Abstract
BackgroundChronic cough has negative effects on quality of life. However, the changes in health-related quality of life and clinical implications remain unclear in Chinese patients with chronic cough.MethodsA standard Chinese version of Leicester cough questionnaire (LCQ) was developed by an established translation procedure and its repeatability was assessed in a preliminary study involving 20 untreated patients with stable chronic cough. The quality of life was measured with the Short form-36 health survey and compared between 110 patients with chronic cough and 90 healthy volunteers. The changes in health-related quality of life were evaluated in the patients with chronic cough with the LCQ just before the specific treatment was initiated and a week after the cough had resolved completely. Cough threshold with inhaled capsaicin, expressed as the lowest concentration of capsaicin required for the induction of ≥5 coughs, was also measured.ResultsThe repeatability of the Chinese version of the LCQ was validated at a four day interval with the intraclass correlation coefficients of 0.89-0.94 for total and domain score (n = 20). The scores of the Short form-36 health survey were significantly lower in patients with chronic cough than those in healthy volunteers. In general, there was no significant difference in overall quality of life between different causes of chronic cough or genders although embarrassment, frustration and sleep disturbance were more common in female patients, as indicated by the LCQ. However, the successful treatment of cough obviously increased the total scores of the LCQ from 14.2 ± 2.7 to 19.5 ± 1.9 (t = 13.7, P < 0.0001). There was a significant correlation between the total score of the LCQ and physical (r = 0.39, P < 0.0001) or mental (r = 0.30, P < 0.001) component summary of the Short form-36 health survey but not between the LCQ and capsaicin cough threshold.ConclusionThe quality of life is significantly impaired in Chinese patients with chronic cough. The Chinese version of the LCQ is a valid measure of cough related quality of life and is repeatable and responsive.
Highlights
Chronic cough has negative effects on quality of life
Validation of repeatability on the Chinese version of Leicester cough questionnaire (LCQ) The intraclass correlation coefficient of LCQ repeatability was 0.94 (95% confidence interval: 0.85-0.98, P = 0.000) for total score, 0.89 (95% confidence interval: 0.73-0.96, P = 0.000) for the physical domain score, 0.93 (95% confidence interval: 0.82-0.97, P = 0.000) for the psychological domain score and 0.92 (95% confidence interval: 0.79-0.97, P = 0.000) for the social domain score respectively
The results showed that the quality of life in patients with chronic cough deteriorated significantly when compared with healthy volunteers
Summary
Chronic cough has negative effects on quality of life. the changes in health-related quality of life and clinical implications remain unclear in Chinese patients with chronic cough. Lack of scores specific for cough or only several items referring to cough in generic instruments makes it difficult to precisely measure the tiny changes of HRQOL caused by cough. To overcome these shortages, the tools specific for assessments of HRQOL on chronic cough have been designed, including the cough-specific quality-of-life questionnaire [5], Leicester cough questionnaire (LCQ) [6] and chronic cough impact questionnaire [7]. The utilization of these instruments has greatly promoted the studies of quality of life in chronic cough patients
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