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Published in: Health and Quality of Life Outcomes 1/2012

Open Access 01-12-2012 | Short report

Measurement equivalence of the SF-36 in the canadian multicentre osteoporosis study

Authors: Lisa M Lix, Beliz Acan Osman, Jonathan D Adachi, Tanveer Towheed, Wilma Hopman, K Shawn Davison, William D Leslie

Published in: Health and Quality of Life Outcomes | Issue 1/2012

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Abstract

Background

Studies that compare health-related quality of life (HRQOL) and other patient-reported outcomes in different populations rest on the assumption that the measure has equivalent psychometric properties across groups. This study examined the measurement equivalence (ME) of the 36-item Medical Outcomes Study Short Form Survey (SF-36), a widely-used measure of HRQOL, by sex and race in a population-based Canadian sample.

Findings

SF-36 data were from the Canadian Multicentre Osteoporosis Study, a prospective cohort study that randomly sampled adult men and women from nine sites across Canada. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) techniques were used to test hypotheses about four forms of ME, which are based on equality of the factor loadings, variances, covariances, and intercepts. Analyses were conducted for Caucasian and non-Caucasian females (n = 6,539) and males (n = 2,884). CFA results revealed that a measurement model with physical and mental health factors provided a good fit to the data. All forms of ME were satisfied for the study groups.

Conclusions

The results suggest that sex and race do not influence the conceptualization of a general measure of HRQOL in the Canadian population.
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Metadata
Title
Measurement equivalence of the SF-36 in the canadian multicentre osteoporosis study
Authors
Lisa M Lix
Beliz Acan Osman
Jonathan D Adachi
Tanveer Towheed
Wilma Hopman
K Shawn Davison
William D Leslie
Publication date
01-12-2012
Publisher
BioMed Central
Published in
Health and Quality of Life Outcomes / Issue 1/2012
Electronic ISSN: 1477-7525
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/1477-7525-10-29

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