INRODUCTION

Stroke is one of the top five leading causes of disability in the Philippines. It has a significant impact on the quality of life (QoL) of patients, particularly in the functional and psycho-emotional aspects. Thus, it is important to understand the health-related quality of life in stroke patients (HRQoLISP), which focuses on the clinical impact of the disease and disability. The assessment of a stroke patient’s QoL is prognostically significant as it can predict a patient’s treatment success and survival.

OBJECTIVE

This study aims to translate the HRQoLISP-26 into Filipino and assess its content validity for Filipino adult stroke patients.

METHODOLOGY

The HRQoLISP-26 was translated into Filipino using a forward translation protocol and an expert analyzed the forward translation. Selected expert committee members reviewed the first version to assess for content validity and the questionnaire was modified accordingly. The content validity index (CVI) was used for content validity.

RESULTS

Majority of the revisions made were done to improve the semantic and grammatical accuracy of items in the Filipino version of the HRQoLISP-26. Only a few items had no revisions implemented. No revisions were done in the final version of the translated questionnaire as each item had a CVI of 1 indicating that it has good content validity.

CONCLUSION

The Filipino translated HRQoLISP-26 questionnaire is a validated questionnaire that allows assessment of a stroke survivor’s QoL.

Quality Of Life ; Patients ; Life ; Health ; Adult ; Stroke

BACKGROUND: Platelet-rich plasma (PRP), a blood-based product containing platelets and growth factors, is being utilized to treat numerous non-hemostatic disorders. Studies have explored the use of PRP to provide rapid repair, healing, and recovery from various injuries; some studies mentioned the effectiveness of PRP as compared with other forms of treatment like the use of hyaluronic acid. Commercially available PRP systems are available now, and each varies from one another depending on how it is prepared, thus causing variations in platelet concentration and growth factor content. These variations also implicated different therapeutic applications. METHODS: The paper reviews the various applications of PRP, including factors to consider before using PRP therapy, and provides an extensive list of PRP applications. RESULTS: The administration of PRP as a standalone treatment or as a co-therapy results in observed positive outcomes.However, there is a lack of standardization for PRP preparation, increasing the risks for heterogeneity and bias amongst results. CONCLUSION The use of PRP is indeed an option for regenerative therapy, but more research is needed before it can fully be recommended as a primary treatment modality.

Most medical complications following acute stroke are preventable (such as cardiac events, pneumonia, bed sores and venous thrombosis). This was a study on the frequency of medical complications and their association with key performance indicators. Methods: The study used a cross-sectional baseline audit of stroke care practices. The audit captured details on the nature of the stroke, patient demographics, characteristics of hospital care, and compliance with six key quality indicators in Philippine Academy of Rehabilitation Medicine Clinical Practice Guideline on Stroke Rehabilitation. Patient records were retrospectively consecutively sampled. Results: A total of 1,683 patients were included in the audit which came from 49 hospitals. Medical complications were seen in 182 patients (11.2%). Pneumonia contributed to half the medical complications (50%), followed by respiratory failure (7.7%) and gastrointestinal bleeding (3.8%). Presence of medical complications were associated with in-patient mortality (OR 3.3 (95% CI 2.1-5.3)) and prolonged hospital stay (16.1 ± 20.7 days vs 9.6 + 10.9 days). The best predictor model for pneumonia included variables of not having a swallow screen within the first 24 hours, having a nasogastric tube inserted, not achieving medical stability, not having a stroke unit in the admitting hospital, having suffered a previous stroke and being older. Conclusion: Non-adherence to evidence-based stroke care rehabilitation guidelines contributed significantly to medical complications in an audit of Filipino stroke patients