• James W Varni, Christine A Limbers, Lisa G Sorensen, Katie Neighbors, Karen Martz, John C Bucuvalas, Estella M Alonso, and Studies of Pediatric Liver Transplantation Functional Outcomes Group.
• Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, Department of Landscape Architecture and Urban Planning, College of Architecture, Texas A&M University, 3137 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-3137, USA. jvarni@arch.tamu.edu
• Qual Life Res. 2011 Aug 1;20(6):913-21.

ObjectiveThe PedsQL™ (Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory™) is a modular instrument designed to measure health-related quality of life and disease-specific symptoms. The PedsQL™ Cognitive Functioning Scale was developed as a brief generic symptom-specific instrument to measure cognitive functioning. The objective of the present study was to determine the feasibility, reliability, and validity of the PedsQL™ Cognitive Functioning Scale in pediatric liver transplant recipients.MethodsThe 6-item PedsQL™ Cognitive Functioning Scale and the PedsQL™ 4.0 Generic Core Scales were completed by pediatric liver transplant recipients ages 8-18 years (n = 215) and parents of pediatric liver transplant recipients ages 2-18 years (n = 502). Both patient self-report and parent proxy-report were available for 212 cases. The 72-item Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF), a widely validated measure of executive functioning, was completed by 100 parents and 56 teachers on a subset of patients.ResultsThe PedsQL™ Cognitive Functioning Scale demonstrated minimal missing responses (0.0%, child report, 0.67%, parent report), achieved excellent reliability (α = 0.88 child report, 0.94 parent report), distinguished between pediatric patients with liver transplants and healthy children supporting discriminant validity, and was significantly correlated with the PedsQL™ 4.0 Generic Core Scales and the BRIEF supporting construct and concurrent validity, respectively. Pediatric liver transplants recipients experienced cognitive functioning comparable to long-term pediatric cancer survivors.ConclusionsThe results demonstrate the feasibility, reliability, discriminant, construct, and concurrent validity of the PedsQL™ Cognitive Functioning Scale in pediatric liver transplant recipients.

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