Health-related quality of life in recurrent major depressive disorder—A 10-year follow-up study

Abstract

Årdal G, Lund A, Hammar Å. Health-related quality of life in recurrent major depressive disorder—A 10-year follow-up study. Nord J Psychiatry 2012;Early online:1–5. Background: Major depressive disorder strongly affects health-related quality of life (HRQOL). Few studies have followed patients suffering recurrent major depressive disorder (rMDD) and paid attention to HRQOL in remitted state. Aim: The aim of the present study was to assess HRQOL in a 10-year longitudinal perspective in patients suffering rMDD, and comparable healthy control subjects. Results: The results show significant lowered HRQOL in depressed patients on all measured domains in the acute phase of illness. Conclusions: Although HRQOL in the depressed patient group significantly improved on most measures between the two assessments, the patient group still reported a significant lowered HRQOL compared with matched controls at the 10-year follow-up assessment. More research should focus on HRQOL after a depressive episode.

• Depression
• Health-related quality of life
• Longitudinal
• SF-36

Acknowledgments

We are specifically grateful to all the participants in the study and to Randi Hopsdal for invaluable help with the data collection. We would like to thank Marit Schmid and Mari Strand for constructive comments on the manuscript.

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.