A systematic review of quality of life measures for people with intellectual disabilities and challenging behaviours

Background The quality of life (QOL) construct is proposed as a method to assess service outcomes for people utilising disability services. With this in mind, the aim of this study was to conduct a systematic review of available QOL measures for people with intellectual disability (ID) to pinpoint psychometrically sound measures that can be routinely used for service evaluation. Method A systematic search of the disability literature published between 1980 and 2008 was conducted in order to identify appropriate QOL tools for use within an Australian context.Twenty-four QOL instruments were identified and each instrument was then evaluated against a set of psychometric and measurement criteria