Quality of life in diabetic patients registered with primary health care services in Sweden.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the health-related quality of life in diabetic subjects in primary health care.


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


METHODS
Three community health centres in the Metropolitan Stockholm area.


METHODS
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.


METHODS
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.
Wändell
P E
PE
Department of Clinical Neuroscience and Family Medicine, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden.
Brorsson
B
B
Aberg
H
H
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D003153:Community Health Services; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003920:Diabetes Mellitus; D005260:Female; D006306:Health Surveys; D006801:Humans; D016014:Linear Models; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D011788:Quality of Life; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D013548:Sweden