Observational Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2019. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Diabetes. Feb 15, 2019; 10(2): 87-95
Published online Feb 15, 2019. doi: 10.4239/wjd.v10.i2.87
Quantities of comorbidities affects physical, but not mental health related quality of life in type 1 diabetes with confirmed polyneuropathy
Anne-Marie L Wegeberg, Theresa Meldgaard, Sofie Hyldahl, Poul Erik Jakobsen, Asbjørn M Drewes, Birgitte Brock, Christina Brock
Anne-Marie L Wegeberg, Theresa Meldgaard, Sofie Hyldahl, Asbjørn M Drewes, Christina Brock, Mech-Sense, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Aalborg University Hospital and Clinical Institute, Aalborg University, Aalborg 9000, Denmark
Poul Erik Jakobsen, Asbjørn M Drewes, Steno Diabetes Center North Judland, Region Nordjylland, Aalborg 9000, Denmark
Birgitte Brock, Steno Diabetes Center Copenhagen, Region Hovedstaden, Gentofte 2820, Denmark
Christina Brock, Department of Pharmacotherapy and Development, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen 1071, Denmark
Author contributions: Brock C and Brock B conceptualised the study; Brock C, Brock B, Jakobsen PE and Drewes AM designed the study; Meldgaard T acquired the data; Wegeberg AML, Hyldahl S and Brock C interpreted data; Wegeberg AML drafted the manuscript and all author contributed intellectual property and approved the final version; the authors declare that there is no conflict of interest associated with this manuscript.
Supported by Aalborg University; Novo Nordisk Scandinavia AS; Empowering Industry and Research EIR Northern Jutland; during the conduct of the study; and Innovation Fund Denmark, Individuals, Disease and Society, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Institutional review board statement: The study was approved by The North Denmark Region Committee on Health Research Ethics, Denmark (N-20130077).
Informed consent statement: All subjects gave their informed consent prior to inclusion.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Dr. Brock reports grants from Aalborg University, from Novo Nordisk Scandinavia AS, from Empowering Industry and Research EIR Northern Jutland, grants from Innovation Fund Denmark, Individuals, Disease and Society, Copenhagen, Denmark, during the conduct of the study.
STROBE statement: The authors have read the STROBE Statement-checklist of items, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the STROBE Statement-checklist of items.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Christina Brock, DVM, PhD, Associate Professor, Senior Scientist, Mech-Sense, Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Aalborg University Hospital and Clinical Institute, Aalborg University, Mølleparkvej 4, Aalborg 9000, Denmark. christina.brock@rn.dk
Telephone: +45-97-660510
Received: January 2, 2019
Peer-review started: January 4, 2019
First decision: January 12, 2019
Revised: January 16, 2019
Accepted: February 11, 2019
Article in press: February 12, 2019
Published online: February 15, 2019
Processing time: 46 Days and 19.7 Hours
ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS
Research background

Diabetic symmetrical peripheral neuropathy is a frequent complication to type 1 diabetes and is associated to incapacitating complication and decreased lifespan, possibly affecting health related quality of life (HRQoL). The 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) is a generic patient reported questionnaire, which can be used to evaluate mental and physical HRQoL in patients with diabetes.

Research motivation

HRQoL is an increasingly acknowledged method in clinical practice, to evaluate patient centred outcomes in the measurement of disease burden, progression and treatment outcome.

Research objective

To investigate if diabetic neuropathy would decrease physical and mental quality of life measured with SF-36, and if clinical appearance may be associated with the decline.

Research methods

Baseline data of standardised nerve conduction and SF-36 questionnaire as well as information on disease duration, number of comorbidities, vibration perception threshold, number of hypoglycaemic events, HbA1c and administration way of insulin was collected from 48 adults with verified diabetic symmetrical peripheral neuropathy and 21 healthy participants as part of a clinical trial.

Research results

People with diabetic symmetrical peripheral neuropathy had a significantly decreased physical score, but not mental score compared with healthy. Furthermore, this decrease in physical score was associated with total number of comorbidities, comorbidities relation to diabetes and HbA1c as well as comorbidities not related to diabetes.

Research conclusions

HRQoL is an important tool for evaluate patient centred outcomes in people with diabetes and is decreased with diabetic symmetrical peripheral neuropathy but also with increase in symptoms and suboptimal long-term glucose measures.

Research perspectives

HRQoL is an informative measure for use in investigation of diabetes and related neuropathy or symptoms in the future.