Personality traits and peritoneal dialysis patients’ prognosis

Objective: Peritoneal dialysis (PD) requires high patient conscientiousness. Therefore, we aimed to investigate the relationship between conscientiousness score and prognosis in PD patients. Methods: The ten-item Big Five Personality Inventory’s Chinese version was used to assess the conscientiousness score. Basic clinical information, prior medical history, hematological examination results, the occurrence of the first peritonitis and catheter-related infection, the start of hemodialysis, and the time of renal transplantation were collected. The patients were split into two groups, high and low conscientiousness groups, based on the mean value of the conscientiousness score. The differences in prognostic indicators were compared between groups, and the association between conscientiousness score and prognostic indicators in PD patients was assessed. Results: Enrolled PD patients were divided into low conscientiousness group 103 and high conscientiousness group 98. There were significant differences in serum albumin (p = 0.021) and iPTH (p = 0.045) between the two groups. Multivariate Cox regression analysis identified conscientiousness score as an independent risk factor for the development of first peritonitis (HR = 0.558, 95% CI 0.400–0.779, p = 0.001) and first catheter-related infection (HR = 0.544, 95% CI 0.308–0.962, p = 0.036) in PD patients. Conscientiousness score (HR = 2.377, 95% CI 1.109–5.095, p = 0.026) was independently associated with renal transplantation. Conclusion: Conscientiousness personality is closely related to the prognosis of PD patients.