Quality of life of children and adolescents with cancer: revision of studies literature that used the pediatric quality of life inventoryTM

Objective. To assess the quality of life of children and adolescentswith cancer of studies that applied the Pediatric Quality of LifeInventory 3.0 Cancer Module. Methodology. The study wascarried out on the basis of data Scopus Web of Science, BIREME,EBSCO host and Psychoinfo of articles in Spanish, English andPortuguese, and published from 1998 to 2013 that used thePediatric Quality of life Inventory 3.0 Cancer Module. Results.21 articles were selected, of which 47.6% were carried out inAmerica, and 61.9% of editions comprehended from 2011 to2013. The scores variation by dimensions and in general wasprobably related for the selection of comparison groups, as thediversity of inclusion criteria and variants may be observed forthe analysis in each study. The existence of a standard dimensioncould not be verified either for children´s /adolescents reports orfor parents. Conclusion. It is concluded that the scores averagesby dimensions in general have not achieved values below 30 andthe largest scores by dimension are above 80. It is suggested thatthe treatment anxiety dimension in children´s and adolescents´sreports may have obtained the largest scores within each study,that is lesser than the difficulty of the children and adolescentsin face of the treatment and cancer. Nursing becomes a constantpresence in the life of children and adolescents with cancer and itmay provide a better quality of life for developing nursing activitiesand the team may demistify, clarify and help in all phases of theillness and treatment.Key words: quality of life; child; adolescent; questionnaire; review