Self-reported health status and disease-specific quality of life one year after treatment for peripheral arterial disease in clinical practice

BACKGROUND: VascuQoL-6 (VQ-6) is a disease-specific quality of life (QoL) instrument validated for use in clinical practice and vascular registries before and after treatment for peripheral arterial disease (PAD). To improve future interpretation of self-reported outcome, an unselected cohort was followed through one year to provide observational data after both conservative and invasive treatment. METHODS: Consecutive patients with intermittent claudication (IC) or critical limb ischemia (CLI) were included. All patients completed VQ-6 and Short Form-36 (SF-36), and were evaluated with ankle-brachial index (ABI) measurement pre- and post-exercise, a constant load treadmill test and clinical consultation at baseline and after one year. Change statistics and correlation analysis were used to describe self-reported outcome after conservative and invasive treatment for PAD. RESULTS: One hundred seventy-one patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD) were included, 70 (41%) female. 147 (86%) of the patients suffered from IC. 136 (80%) patients had one-year follow up, death, amputation and withdrawal were the major causes of loss to follow-up. Forty-eight patients (35%) evaluated their health to be unchanged compared to one year ago. There was a strong correlation between self-reported general health status based on SF-36 item 2 and VQ-6 summary score (Spearmans rho = − 0.536). Patients admitted to invasive intervention (endovascular or surgery) improved in all domains of SF-36, and in the physical component summary score (SF-36 PCS). Patients admitted to best medical treatment, smoking cessation and walking exercise (conservative group) improved only in the physical domains. There was significant improvement in VQ-6 summary score for both groups, mean 2.20 (95%CI 1.14–3.27) in the conservative group, 4.68 (95%CI 3.67–5.70) in the invasive group. VQ-6 sum score improved more than four points for 56% in the invasive group, 36% in the conservative group. CONCLUSIONS: Treatment for symptomatic PAD, both invasive and conservative, improves self-reported health status and disease specific QoL after one year. Interpretation of patient-reported outcome measured with VQ-6 after surgery or endovascular treatment must be seen in light of the improvement from conservative treatment alone. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN14846962 (retrospectively registered).