Three-year trajectories of global perceived quality of life for youth with chronic health conditions

Qual Life Res (2016) 25:31573171 DOI 10.1007/s11136-016-1353-z

http://crossmark.crossref.org/dialog/?doi=10.1007/s11136-016-1353-z&domain=pdf

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Web End = Three-year trajectories of global perceived quality of life for youth with chronic health conditions

Janette McDougall1 David J. DeWit2 Megan Nichols1 Linda Miller2

F. Virginia Wright3

Accepted: 28 June 2016 / Published online: 5 July 2016 The Author(s) 2016. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com

AbstractPurpose Objectives of this longitudinal study were to examine 3-year trajectories of global perceived quality of life (QOL) for youth with chronic health conditions, as obtained from youth and parent reports, and to identify personal and environmental factors associated with the trajectory groups for each perspective.

Methods Youth with various chronic conditions aged 1117 years and one of their parents were recruited from eight childrens treatment centers. Latent class growth analysis was used to investigate perceived QOL trajectories (separately for youth and parent perspectives) over a 3-year period (four data collection time points spaced 12 months

apart). Multinomial logistic regression was employed to identify factors associated with these trajectories.

Results A total of 439 youth and one of their parents participated at baseline, and 302 (69 %) of those youth/parent dyads completed all four data collection time points. Two QOL trajectories were identied for the youth analysis: high and stable (85.7 %) and moderate/ low and stable (14.3 %), while three trajectories were found for the parent analysis: high and stable (35.7 %), moderate and stable (46.6 %), and moderate/low and stable (17.7 %). Relative to the high and stable groups, youth with more reported pain/other physical symptoms, emotional symptoms, and home/community barriers were more likely to be in the moderate and stable or moderate/low and stable groups. Also, youth with higher reported self-determination, spirituality, family social support, family functioning, school productivity/ engagement, and school belongingness/safety were less likely to be in the moderate and stable or moderate/ low and stable groups, compared to the high and stable groups.

Conclusion Findings suggest that youth with chronic conditions experience stable global perceived QOL across time, but that some individuals maintain stability at moderate to moderate/low levels which is related to ongoing personal and environmental inuences. Potential benets of universal strategies and programs to safeguard resilience for all youth and targeted interventions to optimize...