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Br J Ophthalmol 2002;86:8-11 doi:10.1136/bjo.86.1.8
  • Value based ophthalmology

Quality of life and systemic comorbidities in patients with ophthalmic disease

  1. Melissa M Brown1,2,
  2. Gary C Brown1,3,
  3. Sanjay Sharma1,4,
  4. Hussein Hollands1,
  5. Jennifer Landy1
  1. 1Center for Evidence-Based Health Care Economics, Flourtown, PA, USA
  2. 2The Cataract and General Eye Care Service
  3. 3The Retina Vascular Unit
  4. 4Wills Eye Hospital, Jefferson Medical College, Philadelphia, and the Center for Cost-Effective Ocular Health Policy, Queens Medical College, Kingston, Ontario
  1. Correspondence to: Melissa M Brown, MD, MN, MBA, Center for Evidence-Based Health Care Economics, Suite 210, 1107 Bethlehem Pike, Flourtown, PA 19031, USA; Lissa1011{at}aol.com
  • Accepted 18 July 2001

Abstract

Aim: To ascertain the effect of serious systemic comorbidities upon the quality of life of patients with ophthalmic diseases.

Methods: Time tradeoff utility values were obtained in consecutive ophthalmic patients who presented with ocular disease. Multivariate analysis was undertaken to evaluate whether the systemic comorbidities of diabetes mellitus, heart disease, cancer, cerebrovascular accident, and/or renal failure requiring dialysis influenced ocular utility values.

Results: Among the 390 patients with ocular diseases studied, 250 had the systemic comorbidities of diabetes mellitus, heart disease, cancer, stroke, and/or renal failure requiring dialysis, while 140 lacked these comorbidities. There was no statistically significant difference (p = 0.091) between the comorbidity and no comorbidity groups in self assessed quality of life as measured by ocular utility values after taking into account potentially confounding variables.

Conclusions: In patients with ocular disease, ocular utility values related to the visual loss do not appear to be affected by the presence of select, concomitant, serious systemic diseases. Thus, visual loss seems to cause a similar diminution in self assessed quality of life in those who do and do not have serious associated systemic comorbidities. This information has important implications for the calculation of cost effective analyses.

Footnotes

  • Series editors: Melissa Brown and Gary Brown

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