Patients undergoing knee surgery provided accurate ratings of preoperative quality of life and function 2 weeks after surgery

Objective: To evaluate patients' ability to recall their preoperative self-reported quality of life, function, and general health 2 weeks postoperatively. Study Design and Setting: We randomized consecutive patients undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery to group I (assessments at 4 weeks preoperatively, on the day of surgery, and 2 weeks and 12 months postoperatively) or group 11 (assessments at 2 weeks and 12 months postoperatively). At each visit patients completed disease-specific, knee-specific, and generic health rating scales. At a median of 2 weeks postoperative (range, 0.6 to 14 weeks), patients completed questionnaires according to their recollection of their health 2 weeks before surgery. Results: Agreement between actual and recalled data was excellent for disease-specific (ICCWOMET = 0.88 (95% Cl 0.82-0.91), ICCACL-QOL = 0.86 (95% CI 0.75-0.91)), knee-specific (ICCIKDC = 0.92 (95% Cl 0.90-0.94), ICCKOOS = 0.93 (95% Cl 0.91 to 0.95), and general physical health (ICCSF-36(PCS) = 0.81 (95% Cl 0.75-0.86)) instruments. Agreement for general mental health was moderate (ICCSF-36(MCS) = 0.67 (95% CI 0.58-0.75). Greater error associated with recalled ratings contributed to small increases in sample size requirements or small decreases in power to detect differences between groups. Conclusion: Patients recalled their preoperative quality of life, function, and general health at 2 weeks postoperative with sufficiently high accuracy to warrant substituting prospectively collected baseline data with recalled ratings. (c) 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.