Supplementary Material for: Development of OSTQOL: A Measure of Quality of Life for Patients in Opioid Substitution Treatment

<b><i>Background:</i></b> Quality of life (QOL) of patients in opioid substitution treatment (OST) is increasingly being addressed in research. However, no disease- or treatment-specific instrument is available to assess the QOL of this target population. The purpose of this project was to develop the first QOL instrument for OST patients. <b><i>Methods:</i></b> Focus groups with 60 OST patients were analyzed using thematic analysis to elicit key QOL themes as perceived by patients. Identified themes were developed into items and refined through pilot testing and cognitive debriefing. The resulting 82 items were tested in a large sample of OST patients (<i>n</i> = 577). Principal component analysis with varimax rotation was performed to explore a possible factor structure and reduce the number of items. Psychometric properties were assessed. <b><i>Results:</i></b> Factor analysis revealed 6 subscales accounting for 46.1% of the variance: Personal Development, Mental Distress, Social Contacts, Material Well-being, Opioid Substitution Treatment, and Discrimination. The 38-item instrument demonstrated good to acceptable internal consistency reliability for all subscales (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.75–0.88), and good convergent and discriminant validity. <b><i>Conclusion:</i></b> The Opioid Substitution Treatment Quality of Life scale (OSTQOL) is a multidimensional instrument with low respondent and administrator burden. A thorough validation is needed to assess its validity.

<b><i>研究背景：</i></b> 接受阿片类药物替代治疗（Opioid Substitution Treatment, OST）患者的生活质量（Quality of Life, QOL）正日益受到研究关注，但目前尚无针对该目标人群的疾病或治疗特异性量表来评估其生活质量。本研究旨在开发首款针对阿片类药物替代治疗患者的生活质量评估工具。<b><i>研究方法：</i></b> 对60名阿片类药物替代治疗患者的专题小组访谈数据开展主题分析，以挖掘患者感知到的核心生活质量相关主题；将识别出的主题转化为量表条目，并通过预试验与认知访谈对条目进行优化。最终形成的82个条目在577名阿片类药物替代治疗患者组成的大样本中进行测试，采用方差最大正交旋转的主成分分析探索潜在因子结构并精简条目数量，同时评估量表的心理测量学属性。<b><i>研究结果：</i></b> 因子分析结果显示共得到6个维度，累计解释总变异的46.1%，分别为个人发展、心理困扰、社会交往、物质生活状况、阿片类药物替代治疗与歧视经历。包含38个条目的该量表在所有维度上均表现出良好至可接受的内部一致性信度（克朗巴赫α系数为0.75~0.88），同时具备良好的会聚效度与区分效度。<b><i>研究结论：</i></b> 阿片类药物替代治疗生活质量量表（Opioid Substitution Treatment Quality of Life scale, OSTQOL）是一款多维度评估工具，对作答者与施测者的负担均较低，未来仍需开展全面的验证工作以进一步评估其效度。