Links between psychological factors and health-related quality of life in pulmonary hypertension

Abstract

Introduction: Due to advances in diagnosis and treatment, people with pulmonary hypertension (PH) are now living longer. PH has become a chronic rather than an acute disease and instead of focussing solely on mortality, attention to quality of life (QoL) is becoming more appropriate.

Objective: The study was designed to investigate the psychological factors affecting people with PAH, IPAH and CTEPH. It aimed to test the relationships between hope, optimism and health-related quality of life (HRQoL), as very little research is available on the psychological predictor variables of HRQoL in this disease group.

Method: 99 people with PH (81.7% female and 18.3% male) aged between 18 and 79 took part in the cross-sectional research by completing an online questionnaire about their experiences of living with PH. This included the Herth Hope Index, Life Orientation Test-Revised (optimism scale) and emPHasis-10 (HRQoL scale), as well as specific questions about their illness.

Results: Analysis showed significant relationships between hope and HRQoL (r(97)=-0.48, p<0.001), and optimism and HRQoL (r(97)=-0.45, p<0.001). There were no relationships found for age, gender or time since diagnosis, however, some differences were found between different disease types and people using different treatments.

Conclusions: Results have increased understanding of the factors that influence the experience of living with PH. Findings should initiate further research into the potential to manipulate predictor variables in order to improve HRQoL and also to assess whether these variables affect PH symptomology.