Health-Related Quality of Life After Laparoscopic Cholecystectomy

Abstract

Background This study aimed to determine the mean improvement in the quality of life (QoL) after laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) in patients with symptomatic cholelithiasis. Methodology After obtaining approval from the hospital's ethical committee, the Gastrointestinal Quality of Life Index (GIQLI) proforma was filled on admission (T0) and at week six (T1) postoperatively. All data were collected, and GIQLI scores were calculated for individual patients. Results In our study, among the 70 patients undergoing LC, 20% (n = 14) were aged 18-30 years and 80% (n = 56) were aged 31-60 years, with the mean ± standard deviation calculated as 41.56 ± 10.13 years. Overall, 44.29% (n = 31) of patients were men and 55.71% (n = 39) were women. GIQLI scores were 94.64 ± 2.24 for pre-treatment and 106.09 ± 2.40 for post-treatment, with a mean change of 11.44 ± 3.29, and a p-value of 0.001, showing a significant difference. Conclusions The mean improvement in QoL after LC in patients with symptomatic cholelithiasis is significantly higher when compared with pretreatment.

Keywords: cholelithiasis; gallstone disease; gastrointestinal quality of life indicator (giqli); health-related quality of life (hrqol); laparoscopic cholecystectomy.