AYMERICH M, JOVELL AJ; International Society of Technology Assessment in Health Care. Meeting.

Annu Meet Int Soc Technol Assess Health Care Int Soc Technol Assess Health Care Meet. 2001; 17: abstract no. 5.

Catalan Agency for Health Technology Assessment and Research, Fundaci? Biblioteca Josep Laporte

Introduction - MS is a chronic disease of unknown etiology. Prognosis shows great individual variability, although an important number of cases evolve to partial or total disability. However, few studies have been published about the MS impact on patients' and caregivers' health status. The objective of the study was to describe the impact of the disease on patients' and caregivers' health.Methods - A cross-sectional multicenter study was designed. Four health related quality of life (HRQL) instruments were used: SF-36 and the EuroQol visual analogue scale (VAS) for the patient; SF-12 and GHQ-12 for the caregiver. All first three instruments are generic and rang from 0 to 100 where a greater score means a better HRQL. The GHQ-12 is a mental health screening instrument and a score ?3 means a probable case of mental disorder.Results - Overall, 705 patients and 551 caregivers were recruited in 9 hospitals during more than three years (1997-2000). MS patients were mostly women (65%), 40 (?12) years old, with studies (<1% had no studies and 20% had University degrees), married (69%), and with an employment situation of disability leave (33,5%). They mainly had the relapsing-remitting MS pattern (78%), the mean disability measured by the EDSS scale was 3 (SD:2,16), with 6,33 (DE: 5,4) years of disease evolution. The mean VAS score was 63,7 (SD:20,3). Their HRQL measured by SF-36 was 39,9 (SD:10,4) for the physical component, and 44,4 (SD:12) for the mental component. MS caregivers were also mostly women (51%), 45 (?13) years old, with studies (only 2% had no studies and 15% had a University degree), and with an employment situation of working for pay. They have been leaving a mean of 11 (?10) years with the patient and giving care for 3 (?6) hours per day. Their HRQL measured by means of SF-12 was 49,6 (SD:10) for the physical component, and 46,4 (SD:10,6) for the mental component. Among caregivers, 16% were taking some kind of psychotropic drugs or were receiving psychotherapy, and 147 caregivers (21%) had a score in the GHQ-12 of probable mental disorder.Conclusions - The MS impact on patients' and caregivers' health status is important, and especially on mental health. These data suggest that considering chronic disabling diseases, the health care system should take into account not only the patient, but also those indirectly affected by the patient disease such as caregivers.

Publication Types:

• Meeting Abstracts

Keywords:

• Caregivers
• Chronic Disease
• Cross-Sectional Studies
• Disabled Persons
• Female
• Health Status
• Health Status Indicators
• Humans
• Mental Health
• Multiple Sclerosis
• hsrmtgs

Other ID:

• GWHSR0002658

UI: 102274334

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