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Observational Study
. 2019 Apr 8;20(1):122.
doi: 10.1186/s12882-019-1316-z.

Quality of life among patients with moderate to advanced chronic kidney disease in Ghana - a single centre study

Elliot K Tannor  1 , Betty R Norman  2 , Kwame K Adusei  3 , Fred S Sarfo  2 , Mogamat R Davids  4 , George Bedu-Addo  2
Affiliations
Observational Study

Quality of life among patients with moderate to advanced chronic kidney disease in Ghana - a single centre study

Elliot K Tannor et al. BMC Nephrol. .

Abstract

Background: The prevalence of chronic kidney disease (CKD) is increasing worldwide and in Africa. Health related quality of life (QOL) has become an essential outcome measure for patients with CKD and end stage renal disease (ESRD). There is growing interest worldwide in QOL of CKD patients but paucity of data in Ghana. This study sought to assess QOL in patients with moderate to advanced CKD (not on dialysis) and establish its determinants.

Methods: We conducted a cross sectional observational study at the renal outpatient clinic at Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH). We collected demographic, clinical and laboratory data. A pretested self-administered Research and Development corporation (RAND®) 36-Item Health Survey questionnaire was administered and QOL scores in physical component summary (PCS) and mental component summary (MCS) were computed. Determinants of QOL were established by simple and multiple linear regression. P value of < 0.05 was considered statistically significant.

Results: The study included 202 patients with CKD not on dialysis. There were 118(58.5%) males. Mean age was 46.7 ± 16.2 years. The majority, 165(81.7%) of patients were on monthly salaries of less than GHS 500 (~USD 125). Chronic glomerulonephritis was the most common cause of CKD in 118 (58.5%) patients followed by diabetes mellitus in 40 (19.8%) patients and hypertension in 19 (9.4%) patients. The median serum creatinine was 634.2 μmol/L (IQR 333-1248) and the median eGFR was 7 ml/min/1.73m2 (IQR 3-16). The most common stage was CKD stage 5 accounting for 143 (71.1%), followed by CKD stage 4 with 45 (22.4%) of cases and 13 (6.5%) of CKD stage 3. The overall mean QOL score was 40.3 ± 15.4. MCS score was significantly lower than PCS score (37.3 ± 10.8 versus 43.3 ± 21.6, P < 0.001). Multiple linear regression showed that low monthly income (p = 0.002) and low haemoglobin levels (p = 0.003) were predictive of overall mean QOL.

Conclusion: Patients with moderate to advanced CKD had low-income status, presented with advanced disease and had poor QOL. Anaemia and low-income status were significantly associated with poor QOL.

Keywords: Chronic kidney disease; Ghana; Quality of life.

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Conflict of interest statement

Ethics approval and consent to participate

Ethical approval from the Committee on Human Research, Publications and Ethics (CHRPE), Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology and KATH was obtained before the commencement of the study. Written informed consent was provided by all participants.

Consent for publication

Informed consent provided by the participants. All authors read the final manuscript and consented to publication.

Competing interests

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Publisher’s Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

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