Pain, Depression, and Quality of Life: A Description of Factors Related to Venous Leg Wounds

Date of Completion

January 2012

Keywords

Health Sciences, Nursing

Degree

Ph.D.

Abstract

The aim of this study was to describe wound severity, unpleasant symptoms and their relationship between depression and quality of life in a sample of persons with Chronic Venous Leg Wounds (CVLW). The study hypothesis was that pain and wound severity, including wetness and odor, would be positively correlated to depression and inversely related to quality of life. A descriptive, correlational design and regression analyses were used to study the relationship of pain, depression, quality of life, wound severity, and demographic factors in a single population of people with CVLW from two outpatient wound centers. ^ One hundred eight participants completed instruments to measure pain, as scored by the Brief Pain Inventory — Short Form (BPI-SF), depression symptoms (Center for Epidemiological Study, or CES-D), and quality of life measures (Rand Short Form -36, or SF-36), Demographic and wound severity scores (Bates Jensen Wound Assessment Tool, or B-WAT), were also recorded from the medical record. ^ The mean participant age was 66.5 years (SD = 14.50). Females comprised 47.2% (n = 51) of the sample. The majority of participants were non-Hispanic, White 79.6% (n = 86). Two stepwise regression models were performed, one with the CES-D score, and a second with the SF-36 QOL score, as the dependent variable. The BPI-SF scores of pain severity and interference, and wound severity as measured by the B-WAT were the predictors. The significant depression model included the BPI-SF pain interference and wound severity scores, with a resulting prediction equation of CES-D, R 2 = .28, adjusted R2 = .27, F (1,102) = 20.19, p = .000. The QOL model was significant with only the pain interference variable as a predictor, R 2 = .38 adjusted R2 = .37, F (1,95) = 58.17, p= . 000. ^ Pain interference was the most important symptom directly correlated to increased depression symptoms as measured by the CES-D score and to reduced quality of life, as measured by the SF-36. ^

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