Development and validation of quality of life scale for people living with HIV

Abstract

Objective: to develop and validate a scale to measure the quality of life of people living with HIV in Brazil. Method: methodological study conducted in a Brazilian care service specialized in sexually transmissible infections/AIDS between 2017 and 2019 addressing people living with HIV. The scale’s development and validation included exploratory factor analysis to describe its factor structure and psychometric properties, Multitrait-Multimethod analysis to verify its validity and Cronbach’s alpha for reliability. Floor and ceiling effects were described according to the responses’ frequency distribution. Results: a total of 460 people living with HIV participated. Most were men 276 (60.0%) aged 43 on average (SD=±12.4). The Exploratory Factor Analysis revealed four factors with 39.9% of explained variance. The total scale presented satisfactory reliability with a Cronbach’s alpha equal to 85.0%. Most items presented satisfactory convergent and divergent validity. The presence of floor and ceiling effects were found. The scale’s final version was composed of 45 items. Conclusion: the Quali-HIV Scale is a valid and reliable tool to measure the quality of life of people living with HIV.