The Reliability of the Malay Versions of Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS) and Mcgill Quality of Life Questionnaire (MQOL) among a Group of Patients with Cancer in Malaysia

Objective: This study intends to investigate the reliability, validity and patients’ perception towards the Malay Hospital Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS) and Malay McGill Quality of Life Questionnaire (MMQoL) in Terengganu cancer patients. Methods: It was conducted cross-sectionally in Hospital Sultanah Nur Zahirah (HSNZ), Kuala Terengganu, Malaysia recruiting 80 patients fulfilling the inclusion criteria. Socio-demographic data was analyzed descriptively and presented as frequencies. To examine patients’ perception towards the applicability and practicality, completion time, comprehension, comprehensiveness difficulty and instrusiveness of the instruments were inquired via a 5-item survey. For reliability purposes, the internal consistency reliability (Cronbach's a) was calculated while Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient (rs) was used to examine the strength of associations between and within instruments (convergent/divergent validity). Results: To the majority of patients, both HADS and MMQoL instruments were considered clear, comprehensive and not difficult to complete (completion time Conclusion: The overall findings suggested that both instruments have exhibited adequate evidence of reliability and validity plus being perceived as favourable for assessing health outcomes among cancer sufferers.