Abstract

EVALUATION OF THE QUALITY OF LIFE IN PATIENTS WITH DIABETIC MACULAR EDEMA AND NEOVASCULAR AGE-RELATED MACULAR DEGENERATION

Julio Alejandro Blanco D´Mendieta, Alhelí Campos Flores, Arturo Carrasco Quiroz, Lizbeth Karina Blanco D´Mendieta, Zaira Lizette Jiménez Díaz, María Carolina Franco Mayorga, Ivonne A. Roy-García and José D. Méndez*

ABSTRACT

Among the most common ocular pathologies are diabetic macular edema and neovascular age-related macular degeneration. This work was designed to determine the quality of life of patients with two conditions: 1. Diabetic macular edema and 2. Neovascular age-related macular degeneration, who attended the ophthalmology outpatient service of a tertiary care hospital. The study was observational, cross-sectional, descriptive, and single center in which the NEI VQF 25 Quality of Life questionnaire was applied to two groups of 30 patients each. Group 1 included patients with diabetic macular edema and Group 2 included 30 patients with neovascular age-related macular degeneration. For data analysis, descriptive statistics were used with measures of central tendency and dispersion such as the mean and standard variation for normal distributions. For the comparison of the data, the t-Student test was used in the quantitative variables. Significant differences were found between both groups. In the Quality of Life scale a global score of 46 was obtained for the group with diabetic macular edema and 60 for the group with neovascular age-related macular degeneration, which indicates a greater degree of involvement in patients with diabetic macular edema (P = 0.003). Differences were observed in the scores obtained between the two groups of patients that reflect impairment in the quality of life associated with visual function. In conclusion, this information clearly shows how two pathologies that affect the macula have different repercussions in areas that are essential for an adequate quality of life. The results of this study reflect a lower quality of life associated with visual function than the reported by other authors.

Keywords: Quality of Life, Visual Function, Diabetic Macular Edema; Neovascular Age-Related Macular Degeneration.