QUANTITY OF DIALYSIS - QUALITY-OF-LIFE - WHAT IS THE RELATIONSHIP

Health related quality of life (HRQOL) is increasingly being used to e valuate physical and psychosocial parameters in patients receiving dia lysis. In patients with chronic illness, these indices are important a djuncts to biochemical measurements. Inadequate dialysis with low urea clearance (Kt/V-urea) has been linked to adverse outcomes in dialysis patients. Little is known about the relationship between dialysis ade quacy and patient reported HRQOL. We evaluated HRQOL in 55 hemodialysi s and 60 peritoneal dialysis patients using the RAND 36 Item Health Su rvey 1.0, measuring the following: physical functioning; role limitati ons (physical); role limitations (emotional); social functioning; emot ional well being; pain; energy; and general health perceptions. Kt/V w as also calculated for each patient. Mean HD Kt/V was 1.44 +/- 0.31 (r ange, 0.5-2.0); mean weekly PD Kt/V was 2.28 +/- 0.90 (range, 1.13-6.0 2). The relationship between Kt/V and HRQOL was tested using Pearson's correlation. No significant association was found for either treatmen t group between Kt/V and any of the domains of HRQOL. Thus, HRQOL seem s to be influenced by factors other than dialysis adequacy, enhancing its role as an independent measure of patient problems otherwise undet ected by traditional objective parameters.