A cross-sectional assessment of health-related quality of life among type 2 diabetes patients in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Objective:This study aimed to describe the health-related quality of life profile among type 2 diabetes patients in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.Method:A cross-sectional study was undertaken using a cohort of 75 patients attending the University Diabetic Centre at King Abdulaziz University Hospital, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. EuroQoL-5 dimension (EQ-5D) scale was used for the assessment of health-related quality of life. EQ-5D was scored using values derived from the UK general population survey. Inferential statistics were applied to evaluate associations between study variables. The Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 20.0 was used for data analysis; p <0.05 was set as the level of statistical significance.Results:Fifty-eight (77.35%) respondents were male with a mean 12.6 ± 8.4 years of history of diabetes. Thirty-four (45.3%) were categorised into the age group of 45–55 years with a mean age of 54 ± 9.2 years. Forty-four (58.7%) were using oral hypoglycaemic agents and 40 (53.3%) had a university level of education. A moderate level of health-related quality of life (0.70 ± 0.22) was measured in the study cohort. Gender was significantly associated with health-related quality of life scores (p = 0.001). The mean EQ-5D score was lower in females compared to male patients (0.58 ± 0.23 vs 0.74 ± 0.20). There were no statistically significant associations between health-related quality of life scores and age groups, duration of diabetes, marital status, educational level and type of treatment.Conclusion:This study has highlighted that Saudi diabetes patients have low levels of health-related quality of life. Healthcare professionals need to consider this when planning holistic patient treatment approaches.

Health Related Quality of Life of Patients with Diabetes in Romania

“…Respondents above 40 years and below 65 years agree to a larger extent with the statements that diabetes prevents me from eating as much as I want. Yet, this result differs from other previous studies reporting no significant differences between age and quality of life of diabetes patients [11,16].…”

“…Patients with diabetes duration over 15 years had their quality of life affected in the last month. Still, this finding differs from other studies results that did not report any significant differences for duration of diabetes and HRQL [11,17].…”

“…In addition, male patients are less likely than female patients to be affected by visual problems caused by diabetes in the last month. The gender differences, with lower satisfaction levels for females than males are in line with the results of previous studies [11][12][13][14][15].…”

Effects of a Psychoeducational Program on Hemoglobin A1c Level and Health-Related Quality of Life in Patients with Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus, Jazan, Saudi Arabia

“…These findings reflected a better response of males towards the interventional program and this is consistent with findings of other studies [32, 36]. The variation between males and women in the Saudi community [40] could be explained by the following: (a) most of the women usually spend most of their time in their houses; (b) there is a lack of physical activity among women; (c) contraindicated eating habits are prevalent among Saudi women; and (d) women are more emotional, while males are able to control their diabetes more and are less likely to have psychological problems than women [41]. Generally, each gender has its specific characteristics (physical, mental, and social) that vary between each other [40].…”

A Study Protocol to Assess the Determinants of Glycaemic Control, Complications and Health Related Quality of Life for People with Type 2 Diabetes in Saudi Arabia

“…However, some of the studies from Saudi Arabia used random blood sugar for determining the level of control, which was a limitation to these studies. In addition, the majority of studies from Saudi Arabia involved a single centre, or were hospital-based [8][9][10]13,[18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26] and may not accurately represent the large and diverse population of the country.…”