Multiple Sclerosis, Anxiety, and Depression in the United Arab Emirates

Abstract

Background: Depression rates in the multiple sclerosis (MS) population in the Arab world have rarely been reported despite people with MS generally having higher rates of depression. We examined depression rates in 416 people with MS versus the general population of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, and their treatment. Methods: A retrospective medical record review of 416 people with MS (age range, 16–80 years) followed up at four large government hospitals in Abu Dhabi was conducted to determine the percentage of people with MS diagnosed as having depression or anxiety. Results: The depression rate in people with MS (10.8%) was close to that in the general population of Abu Dhabi. The adjusted odds ratios of depression by selected variables showed that there was a significant difference (P = .003) between females and males in reporting depression, with more females reporting depression than males. Greater MS duration was also associated with a higher likelihood of being depressed (P = .025). The anxiety rate in the cohort (4.8%) was lower than that in the general Abu Dhabi population (18.7%). Conclusions: The depression rate in people with MS in Abu Dhabi was close to that of the general Abu Dhabi population, but the anxiety rate in people with MS was lower. Explanations for these low rates include possible underreporting by patients and physician factors such as time limitations in busy clinics. Cultural aspects such as strong family support systems and religious factors in this predominantly Muslim population are also possible factors that warrant further investigation.

A global view of comorbidity in multiple sclerosis: a systematic review with a focus on regional differences, methodology, and clinical implications

“…Most of the studies were cohort studies without control subjects and overall, global prevalence rates for depression and anxiety ranged from 21.1–59.4% to 28.1–57.0% for depression and anxiety, respectively. Several studies reported depression at ~ 35% [ 40 – 49 ] and anxiety at ~ 55% in PwMS [ 43 – 46 , 49 – 52 ], and exceptionally low rates were observed for studies performed in Abu Dhabi (10.8–17.5% for depression and 4.8–20.0% for anxiety) [ 53 , 54 ]. Jun-O'Connell et al reported an increased prevalence of bipolar disorder in PwMS in a cohort from the US (type 1 was more significantly more prevalent than type 2 in the study group: 60% versus 30%, respectively), although this study lacked a control group.…”

The prevalence and risk factors of anxiety in multiple sclerosis: A systematic review and meta-analysis

“…After excluding duplicate papers and irrelevant articles, 534 potentially eligible studies remained. Finally, 32 articles ( Noy et al, 1995 ; Nicholl et al, 2001 ; Korostil and Feinstein, 2007 ; Uguz et al, 2008 ; Poder et al, 2009 ; Gay et al, 2010 , 2017 ; Suh et al, 2010 ; Garfield and Lincoln, 2012 ; Jones et al, 2012 ; van der Hiele et al, 2012 ; Leonavicius and Adomaitiene, 2013 ; Askari et al, 2014 ; Terrill et al, 2015 ; Marck et al, 2016 ; Marrie et al, 2018 ; Orr et al, 2018 ; Panda et al, 2018 ; Pham et al, 2018 ; Gascoyne et al, 2019 ; Gill et al, 2019 ; Henry et al, 2019 ; Kotan et al, 2019 ; Schiess et al, 2019 ; Chertcoff et al, 2020 ; Hanna and Strober, 2020 ; Karimi et al, 2020 ; Podda et al, 2020 ; Reyes et al, 2020 ; Wallis et al, 2020 ; Zanghì et al, 2020 ; Ramezani et al, 2021 ) with 15,853 participants were found to be eligible in the analyses, as shown in Table 1 . The flow diagram of the search and study selection process was shown in Figure 2 .…”