Quality of life measures predict cardiovascular health and physical performance in chronic renal failure patients.

Abstract

BackgroundPatients with advanced chronic kidney disease (CKD) experience complex functional and structural changes of the cardiopulmonary and musculoskeletal system. This results in reduced exercise tolerance, quality of life and ultimately premature death. We investigated the relationship between subjective measures of health related quality of life and objective, standardised functional measures for cardiovascular and pulmonary health.MethodsBetween April 2010 and January 2013, 143 CKD stage-5 or CKD5d patients (age 46.0±1.1y, 62.2% male), were recruited prospectively. A control group of 83 healthy individuals treated for essential hypertension (HTN; age 53.2±0.9y, 48.22% male) were recruited at random. All patients completed the SF-36 health survey questionnaire, echocardiography, vascular tonometry and cardiopulmonary exercise testing.ResultsPatients with CKD had significantly lower SF-36 scores than the HTN group; for physical component score (PCS; 45.0 vs 53.9, pConclusionIn CKD and HTN, objective physical performance has a significant effect on quality of life; particularly self-reported physical health and functioning. Therefore, these quality of life measures are indeed a good reflection of physical health correlating highly with objective physical performance measures.