Treatment with antidepressive drugs improved quality of life in chronic hemodialysis patients.
BACKGROUND
Despite some improvements in dialysis therapies, depression still remains an important problem in chronic hemodialysis (HD) patients. In this study, we aimed to investigate the association of depression and its treatment with quality of life (QOL) in HD patients.


METHODS
97 HD patients (52 male, 45 female, mean age 55 +/- 16 years) were enrolled. All patients had been dialyzed for more than 6 months. In order to evaluate QOL of the patients, a short form of Medical Outcomes Study (SF-36) was used. Depression was assessed by using Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Patients who had BDI score > or = 15 were diagnosed as to have depression. Patients with depression received antidepressive treatment (sertralin HCl, 50 mg/day) for an 8-week period. After 8-week antidepressive treatment, all biochemical analysis, SF-36 and BDI were performed again.


RESULTS
40 patients (20 male, 20 female, mean age 56 +/- 14 years) had depression. All parameters related to QOL were significantly decreased in patients with depression as compared to patients without depression. Severity of depression was correlated with QOL parameters. After 8 weeks of treatment, as parallel to changes in BDI, QOL parameters improved in patients with depression.


CONCLUSIONS
Decrease in QOL, associated with depression and antidepressive treatment, improves QOL in HD patients. Hemodialysis patients should be followed-up closely for presence of depression. Treatment of depression with antidepressive drug regimen would lead to relieve the symptoms related to depression and improvement of QOL in these patients. Antidepressive treatment should be required more often than we prescribe in routine clinical practice now.
Turk
S
S
Division of Nephrology, Department of Internal Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, Selcuk University, Istanbul, Turkey.
Atalay
H
H
Altintepe
L
L
Güney
I
I
Okudan
N
N
Tonbul
H Z
HZ
Gökbel
H
H
Kücür
R
R
Yeksan
M
M
Yildiz
A
A
D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000928:Antidepressive Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D003863:Depression / Q000188:drug therapy* / Q000209:etiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007676:Kidney Failure, Chronic / Q000523:psychology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011788:Quality of Life; D006435:Renal Dialysis / Q000523:psychology*; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D000928:Antidepressive Agents