Research Article

Evaluation of Quality of Life in Geriatric Diabetic Patients

10.4274/atfm.galenos.2019.09821

  • Muharrem Bayrak
  • Kenan Çadırcı

Received Date: 18.07.2019 Accepted Date: 02.12.2019 J Ankara Univ Fac Med 2019;72(3):320-327

Objectives:

Type 2 diabetes mellitus has an incidence that increases with age. Many factors affect the life qualities of geriatric diabetic patients. The aim of this study was to evaluate the quality of life in diabetic patients and to examine the effects of diabetic complications, biochemical parameters, and socio-demographic features on the quality of life.

Materials and Methods:

Biochemical parameters, socio-demographic features, and clinical characteristics of 208 diabetic patients at or above 65 years of age who were admitted to the Department of Internal Medicine of Erzurum Regional Research and Education Hospital between January 1st 2018 and December 31st 2018 were evaluated with the short version of the World Health Organization Quality of Life Scale (WHOQOL-BREF).

Results:

This study included 208 subjects; 50% (n=104) of them were male and 50% (n=104) were female. The ages of the cases included in this study were between 65 and 88, and the mean age was 70.82±5.25 years. The mean glycosylated hemoglobin (HbA1C) of the subjects was 8.33±1.86 (range: 5.9-14.5). The mean score of the cases from the General Health dimension of WHOQOL-BREF (TR) was 5.52±1.75 (range: 2-9), from Physical Health dimension was 16.63±4.52 (range: 7-28), from Psychological Health dimension was 15.26±4.08 (range: 6-26), from Social Relations dimension was 6.40±1.94 (range: 3-13), from environmental quality of life was 19.55±4.58 (range: 9-31), and from the total scale was 63.56±15.23 (range: 34-97). The mean scores of the subjects that have diabetic complications from general health, physical health, psychological health, social relations, and environmental quality of health were higher than cases without complications (p=0.001, p=0.001, p=0.001, p=0.001, p=0.001, respectively).

Conclusion:

In geriatric diabetic patients, diabetic complications, age, body mass index, level of education, marital status, duration of diabetes, treatment type, comorbid systemic illness, HbA1C, fasting and postprandial plasma glucose level, glomerular filtration rate, low serum albümin level, and low hemoglobin levels are the factors that affect the quality of life. We believe that effective treatment and close follow up of the patients with geriatric diabetes will increase the quality of life of geriatric diabetic patients.

Keywords: Geriatric Patient, Diabetes Mellitus, Complication, Quality of Life

Full Text (Turkish)