Objectives To assess the feasibility of two patient-reported health related quality of life (HRQOL) instruments, CARE and SF-12, as tools for evaluating HRQOL outcome consequences following renal surgery, and to determine which domains of these HRQOL instruments are most sensitive to HRQOL outcome effects of renal surgery. Methods Patients completed CARE and SF-12 preoperatively (baseline) and at 2, 4, 12 and 24 weeks after surgery. Clinical data, patient response rate, HRQOL changes over time, and likelihood of patient return to baseline HRQOL were evaluated. Results Seventy-one patients were enrolled. Sixty patients completed the baseline and at least one follow-up set of questionnaires. The CARE pain, gastrointestinal (GI) and activity domain scores and the SF-12 physical composite score (PCS) were sensitive to changes in HRQOL (all p<0.05), whereas other domain subscores of these instruments did not change from pre-surgical baseline to post-surgical follow-up. Postsurgical HRQOL effects detected by the CARE pain, GI, and activity domains, and SF-12 PCS were most evident at 2 weeks (all p<0.001). The CARE composite score demonstrated 74% and 50% of patients returned to within 90% of baseline 4 weeks after radical and partial nephrectomy respectively. Conclusion Evaluation of patient-reported HRQOL outcomes after renal surgery is feasible, our findings suggest that the activity, pain, and GI domains of CARE and PCS subscore of the SF-12 are sensitive measures of HRQOL outcome consequences of renal surgery and represent appropriate measures of either care quality or comparative effectiveness analyses of robotic, laparoscopic, and open renal surgery.

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