The role of EHP-30 as specific instrument to assess the quality of life of Italian women with endometriosis.

AIM: Our goals were to assess the psychometrical characteristics of EHP-30, to test its higher degree of appropriateness compared to the generic Quality of Life-assessment tools for Italian women suffering from endometriosis, and to determine its ability to identify the disease's effects on the patients' psychosocial condition, highlighting critical points that can be modified for future linguistic validation. METHODS: Participants to our study were 98 women between 19 and 51-year-old (M=34.4, SD=7.5), selected from patients of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, ARNAS Civico Hospital, Palermo, Italy. All of them had a surgical diagnosis of endometriosis with histological confirmation. Quality of Life was assessed through generic (SF-36) and specific (EHP-30) instruments. RESULTS: Our study shows that the current Italian version of EHP-30 is affected by overall weaker construct validity than the English one; it seems that this has to be ascribed to the inadequacy of the EHP-30 translation into Italian. In particular, unsatisfactory reliability levels have been observed for social support and self-image scales. An incorrect order of response categories has been in addition found out for several items of the Italian version of EHP-30. Research results suggest solutions to adopt for a revision of the EHP-30 Italian version that can satisfy the requirements of validity and reliability. CONCLUSION: Although requiring a structural and linguistic revision, also the Italian version of a specific measurement instrument as EHP-30 is, appears to be more appropriate than generic tools to assess the quality of life of Italian women suffering for endometriosis.

Monitoring of follicular growth for I.V.F.-E.T. programme: the value of E2 assay and echography.

The possibility of a correlation between biological (E2) and morphological (U.S.) parameters, in view of obtaining a correct prevision of follicular maturation and ovulation is discussed. In this study normal patients with a tubal sterility were treated with clomiphene citrate and clomiphene plus H.M.G. The statistical analysis was performed by means of the linear correlation (r) and the relative test of significance (Student T.). The data obtained in this study show that notwithstanding that the rising plasma concentration of E2, which precedes ovulation, is the first and more constant marker of follicular maturation, because of its wide range of variability its usefulness in prediction of ovulation is nearly limited to spontaneous cycles. In fact in stimulated cycles the rising plasma-E2 concentration is rather an independent variable regarding the growth of single follicles (F.D.).