Development of the short version of the Gynecologic Cancer Lymphedema Questionnaire: GCLQ-7

The Gynecologic Cancer Lymphedema Questionnaire (GCLQ) was designed to identify gynecologic cancer patients with lower limb lymphedema (LLL). The questionnaire consists of 20 items distributed over 7 symptom clusters. The present study aimed to develop an abridged form of the GCLQ for simpler screening and more effective follow-up of LLL.

Data that had been collected for the development and validation of the Korean version of the GCLQ (GCLQ-K) were used in this study. Receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curves were drawn according to the individual items of the GCLQ-K. Based on discrimination ability, the candidate items were selected in each symptom cluster. After combining the items, the best model was identified and named GCLQ-7. The area under the ROC curve (AUC) was compared between the GCLQ-7 and the original GCLQ-K.

In total, 11 candidate items were selected from the original GCLQ-K. Among the models made with the candidate items, GCLQ-7, the best model, was constructed with 7 items as follows: 1) limited knee movement, 2) general swelling, 3) redness, 4) firmness/tightness, 5) groin swelling, 6) heaviness, and 7) aching. This model exhibited an AUC of 0.945 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.900-0.991), which is comparable with that of the original GCLQ-K (AUC, 0.867; 95% CI, 0.779-0.956). The best cutoff value was 2 points, at which the sensitivity and specificity were 97.0% and 76.5%, respectively.

The newly developed short version model, GCLQ-7, showed acceptable discrimination ability as compared with the original GCLQ-K.