Defining a patient-reported outcome measure for urethral stricture surgery

A systematic literature review did not identify a formally validated patient-reported outcome measure (PROM) for urethral stricture surgery.

Devise a PROM for urethral stricture surgery and evaluate its psychometric properties in a pilot study to determine suitability for wider implementation.

Constructs were identified from existing condition-specific and health-related quality of life (HRQoL) instruments. Men scheduled for urethroplasty were prospectively enrolled at five centres.

Participants self-completed the draft PROM before and 6 mo after surgery.

Question sets underwent psychometric assessment targeting criterion and content validity, test-retest reliability, internal consistency, acceptability, and responsiveness.

A total of 85 men completed the preoperative PROM, with 49 also completing the postoperative PROM at a median of 146 d; and 31 the preoperative PROM twice at a median interval of 22 d for test-retest analysis. Expert opinion and patient feedback supported content validity. Excellent correlation between voiding symptom scores and maximum flow rate (r = -0.75), supported by parallel improvements in EQ-5D visual analogue and time trade-off scores, established criterion validity. Test-retest intraclass correlation coefficients ranged from 0.83 to 0.91 for the total voiding score and 0.93 for the construct overall; Cronbach's α was 0.80, ranging from 0.76 to 0.80 with any one item deleted. Item-total correlations ranged from 0.44 to 0.63. These values surpassed our predefined thresholds for item inclusion. Significant improvements in condition-specific and HRQoL components following urethroplasty demonstrated responsiveness to change (p < 0.0001). Wider implementation and review of the PROM will be required to establish generalisability across different disease states and for more complex interventions.

This pilot study has defined a succinct, practical, and psychometrically robust PROM designed specifically to quantify changes in voiding symptoms and HRQoL following urethral stricture surgery.