DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS AMONG PATIENTS WITH ACUTE EXACERBATIONS OF CHRONIC OBSTRUCTIVE PULMONARY DISEASE

Abstract

Background; chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) leads to significant morbidity and poor quality of life among patients. This study was conducted to evaluate depression among patients with COPD as there is no such study done in our population. Objective: To determine the frequency of depression among the patients with COPD presenting at a tertiary care hospital. Material and methods; A total of 196 patients with COPD were enrolled from department of Medicine, Nishtar Hospital, Multan, Pakistan in this cross-sectional study. The purpose of the study was explained to each patient and informed consent was obtained. Patient’s basic data and demography was noted. All patients were interviewed for depression using HADS scale. Data were entered and analyzed using SPSS. Results; Of these 196 study cases, 124 (63.3 %) were male patients while 72 (36.7%) were female patients. Mean age of our study cases was 53.89 ± 10.01 years (with minimum age of our study cases was 32 years while maximum age was 70 years). Mean age of the male patients was noted to be 56.82 ± 9.74 years while that female patients was 48.83 ± 8.37 years (p=0.000). Our study results have indicated that majority of our study cases i.e. 116 (59.2 %) were aged more than 50 years. Of these 196 study cases, 94 (48 %) belonged to rural areas and 102 (52 %) belonged to urban areas. Monthly family income up to 35000 rupees was noted in 123 (62.8%) and 73 (37.2%) had monthly family income more than 35000 rupees. Diabetes was presented in 51 (26.0 %) of our study cases. Hypertension was present in 87 (44.4 %) of our study cases. History of smoking was noted in 66 (33.7%) of our study cases. Mean disease duration was 19.68 ± 8.36 months and 129 (65.8%) had duration of illness more than 1 year. Mean HADS score was 10.51 ± 2.41 and depression was present in 131 (66.8%) of our study cases. Conclusion; High frequency of depression was noted in our study among patients having chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Depression was significantly associated with gender, hypertension, smoking and prolonged disease duration. All clinicians treating such patients should check such patients for depression. Early diagnosis of depression followed by early treatment can help to improve clinical outcome and decrease disease related morbidity.

Keywords; Frequency, depression, Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.