Late Breaking Abstract - The SF-36 quality of life scales are sensitive measures of lung function decline

Abstract

Introduction: Although quality of life is impaired in subjects with various lung diseases, the associations with objective measures of lung function have been reported to be weak.

Objectives: To describe the association between lung function decline and impaired self-reported health-status in a large adult general population sample followed for 10 years.

Methods: Associations between changes in lung function and the SF-36 Health Survey was investigated in 3,843 participants in the European Community Respiratory Health Survey (ECRHS) with complete data in the second (2002, age range 30-55 years) and third follow-up (2012). We estimated the association between change of maximum forced expired volume in 1 second (FEV₁) and forced vital capacity (FVC) and change in each of the eight SF-36 health scales adjusting for sex, age and lung function at baseline.

Results: Mean yearly change in FEV₁ were 48 (standard deviation (SD) 30) ml in males and 40(22) ml in women. Corresponding changes in FVC were 40(38) and 31(30) ml. Increasing decline in FEV₁ and FVC were highly significantly associated with reduced scores in the four scales predominantly measuring physical health at follow-up, but not the mental scales. A yearly decline of 50 ml in FEV₁ was associated with a reduced score of 0.25 SD in physical functioning, 0.12 in role limitations due to physical problems, 0.10 in bodily pain and 0.24 in general perception of health.

Conclusion: In a general population followed for 10 years, we found marked effects of lung function decline on the physical scales of the SF-36, but not on the mental scales. This indicates SF-36 scales as sensitive self-reported measures of changes in lung health.

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