The Liver Tumor Ablation Quality of Life Study

Improving the quality of life (QOL) of our patients is the final goal of all treatment. To measure the impact of RFA treatment on our patients before and shortly after the operation, and at later follow-up times, we plan to implement the SF-36 quality of life questionnaire into the Tumor Registry.

The SF-36 Health Survey was developed by QualiMetric.Inc. It measures bodily as well as emotional and social functions. The SF-36 is easy to understand and more reliable than comparable questionnaires, thereby providing high rates of completeness and accuracy.

We are using quality of life evaluation as an adjunct to the Tumor Registry. There is no obligation to participate, however we have attempted to make QOL data collection as easy as possible.

Technical considerations

1. We prepared a version of the SF 36 questionnaire, especially designed for the Tumor Registry. It is downloadable as a pdf - file.
   

   Click on the SF36.pdf icon to download the questionnaire. Please save this file at your computer.

   In most cases you'll print a copy and the patient will answer the questions on paper. There are instructions on the first page as well as fields to enter the patient's name and the application time.
   (Note: It is cheaper and you'll get a better quality if you print all copies from the computer, rather then make copies from a copy-machine)
   
2. After the patient has finished the questionnaire, you keep the original answers and submit them to us via fax at (216) 445-7653.

For all further questions please contact the Registry coordinator or the Webmaster of the RFA site.