Pruritus assessment tools for 6 to 7-year-old children: KidsItchyQoL and ItchyQuant

Measures of pruritus severity and quality of life (QoL) are necessary for the development of therapeutics for children with chronic pruritus. In children, questionnaires need to be developed for specific age groups given the differences in cognitive levels. In this study, we aimed to develop tools to assess QoL and pruritus severity in children 6 to 7-years-old with chronic pruritus.

Based on open interviews with children, we developed a cartoon-annotated QoL instrument, KidsItchyQoL, and validated an existing pruritus severity instrument, ItchyQuant, that measures pruritus impact and severity for the preceding week. Both instruments were administered to 100 children aged 6-7 years with chronic pruritus. The data were analyzed for reliability, reproducibility, construct validity, and responsiveness.

We found the 14-item KidsItchyQoL to be reliable (Cronbach's α = 0.846) and reproducible (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.66) as was the ItchyQuant (ICC = 0.47). With respect to construct validity, examination of eigenvalues of the inter-item polychoric correlation matrix suggested three dominant factors. A subsequent confirmatory factor analysis suggested that a 3-dimensional simple structure model with correlated factors provided a reasonable data representation. The responsiveness of KidsItchyQoL and ItchyQuant (P = .005, GLM procedure) were demonstrated with scores changing as expected with the self-reported change of itch severity.

These results demonstrate promise for a new set of reliable research tools to assess QoL and pruritus severity in children 6 to 7 years of age.