News from Quality of Life Research

By Jan R. Boehnke, PhD, and Richard L. Skolasky​, ScD

The Co-Editors-in-Chief of Quality of Life Research (QLR) would like the opportunity to thank ISOQOL and its members for their support in 2020. We received 2,211 submissions and accepted 328 articles. The journal’s editorial board and guest editors (in 2020: Andries van der Ark, U Amsterdam; Klaas Sijtsma, Tilburg University; William Lenderking, Evidera; Andrew Trigg, Adelphi Values) managed high workloads and helped us identify relevant content for the community of (health-related) quality of life researchers. And last but not least, 1,021 reviewers contributed at least one review, supporting the high quality of our content. Every single one of them makes QLR a success!

In addition to a ‘thank you’ message, we would like to highlight excellent content of the journal, identified by several indicators. Firstly, QLR’s article of the year award which is based on nomination from the Associate Editors and their vote on the quality of the papers after qualitative review:

• WINNER: Olsen, J. A., & Misajon, R. (2020). A conceptual map of health-related quality of life dimensions: key lessons for a new instrument. Quality of Life Research, 29(3), 733–743.
• Austin, E., LeRouge, C., Hartzler, A. L., Segal, C., & Lavallee, D. C. (2020). Capturing the patient voice: implementing patient-reported outcomes across the health system. Quality of Life Research, 29(2), 347–355.
• Helgesson, G., Ernstsson, O., Åström, M., & Burström, K. (2020). Whom should we ask? A systematic literature review of the arguments regarding the most accurate source of information for valuation of health states. Quality of Life Research, 29(6), 1465–1482.

The three most-cited papers in 2020 of the publication years 2018 and 2019 were:

• Prinsen, C. A. C., Mokkink, L. B., Bouter, L. M., Alonso, J., Patrick, D. L., de Vet, H. C. W., & Terwee, C. B. (2018). COSMIN guideline for systematic reviews of patient-reported outcome measures. Quality of Life Research, 27(5), 1147-1157
• Terwee, C. B., Prinsen, C., Chiarotto, A., Westerman, M. J., Patrick, D. L., Alonso, J., Bouter, L. M., de Vet, H., & Mokkink, L. B. (2018). COSMIN methodology for evaluating the content validity of patient-reported outcome measures: a Delphi study. Quality of Life Research, 27(5), 1159–1170.
• Mokkink, L. B., De Vet, H. C., Prinsen, C. A., Patrick, D. L., Alonso, J., Bouter, L. M., & Terwee, C. B. (2018). COSMIN risk of Bias checklist for systematic reviews of patient-reported outcome measures. Quality of Life Research, 27(5), 1171-1179.

Moving away from academic use, the three most downloaded papers in 2020 from the same time period were:

• Prinsen, C. A. C., Mokkink, L. B., Bouter, L. M., Alonso, J., Patrick, D. L., de Vet, H. C. W., & Terwee, C. B. (2018). COSMIN guideline for systematic reviews of patient-reported outcome measures. Quality of Life Research, 27(5), 1147-1157
• Haraldstad, K., Wahl, A., Andenæs, R., Andersen, J. R., Andersen, M. H., Beisland, E., Borge, C. R., Engebretsen, E., Eisemann, M., Halvorsrud, L., Hanssen, T. A., Haugstvedt, A., Haugland, T., Johansen, V. A., Larsen, M. H., Løvereide, L., Løyland, B., Kvarme, L. G., Moons, P., Norekvål, T. M., … LIVSFORSK network (2019). A systematic review of quality of life research in medicine and health sciences. Quality of Life Research, 28(10), 2641–2650.
• Mokkink, L. B., De Vet, H. C., Prinsen, C. A., Patrick, D. L., Alonso, J., Bouter, L. M., & Terwee, C. B. (2018). COSMIN risk of Bias checklist for systematic reviews of patient-reported outcome measures. Quality of Life Research, 27(5), 1171-1179.

The three most downloaded papers from the entire QLR catalogue based on article requests in 2020 were:

• Mathias, S., Crosby, R. D., Bayliss, M. S., L’Italien, G., & Sapra, S. (2014). Measurement properties of the flu-like symptom index from the hepatitis physical symptom severity diary. Quality of Life Research, 23(5), 1489–1496.
• Herdman, M., Gudex, C., Lloyd, A., Janssen, M., Kind, P., Parkin, D., Bonsel, G., & Badia, X. (2011). Development and preliminary testing of the new five-level version of EQ-5D (EQ-5D-5L). Quality of Life Research, 20(10), 1727–1736.
• Mokkink, L. B., Terwee, C. B., Patrick, D. L., Alonso, J., Stratford, P. W., Knol, D. L., Bouter, L. M., & de Vet, H. C. (2010). The COSMIN checklist for assessing the methodological quality of studies on measurement properties of health status measurement instruments: an international Delphi study. Quality of Life Research, 19(4), 539–549.

And finally, the use of research and articles goes beyond academic citations or downloads of the papers. Articles are used in news outlets, social media, and a wide range of other communication channels. The Altmetric score is one way of summarising the use of research published in QLR across these outlets. Below are the three publications with the highest Altmetric score in the years 2018-2020 (mentions on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Reddit, Blogs, news outlets, Faculty of 1000 reviews):

• Ainsworth, T. A., & Spiegel, J. H. (2010). Quality of life of individuals with and without facial feminization surgery or gender reassignment surgery. Quality of Life Research, 19(7), 1019–1024.
• Hyland, M. E., Whalley, B., Jones, R. C., & Masoli, M. (2015). A qualitative study of the impact of severe asthma and its treatment showing that treatment burden is neglected in existing asthma assessment scales. Quality of Life Research, 24(3), 631–639.
• Aucott, J. N., Rebman, A. W., Crowder, L. A., & Kortte, K. B. (2013). Post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome symptomatology and the impact on life functioning: is there something here? Quality of Life Research, 22(1), 75–84.