Quality of life in diabetic patients registered with primary health care services in Sweden

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate the health-related quality of life in diabetic subjects in primary health care.

Design: A cross-sectional, questionnaire survey of diabetic patients registered with primary health services, compared with a standard population sample.

Setting: Three community health centres in the Metropolitan Stockholm area.

Subjects: 341 diabetic individuals aged 21-84 years, with 229 respondents, i.e. 67%. Matched controls of the same age and sex from a standard population sample of 2366 individuals.

Main outcome measures: Quality of life was assessed by the Swedish Health-Related Quality of Life Survey (SWEDQUAL), adopted from the Medical Outcomes Study and consisting of 61 items covering aspects of physical, mental, social, and general health. Medical data were extracted from the medical records.

Results: Diabetic patients had significantly lower scores on all scales (p < 0.001 for ten, and p < 0.01 for one), except for social health, when compared with the standard population sample. Outcomes were correlated with vascular and non-vascular comorbidity, age, and income, but not with level of metabolic control.

Conclusions: Diabetic patients in primary health care have a markedly lower health-related quality of life, compared with a standard population.