Anxiety and Depression among Patients with Uveitis and Ocular Inflammatory Disease at a Tertiary Center in Southern Thailand: Vision-Related Quality of Life, Sociodemographics, and Clinical Characteristics Associated

ABSTRACT

Purpose: To estimate the prevalence of positive anxiety and depression screening in patients with ocular inflammatory disease (OID). The predictors associated with anxiety and depressive symptoms were investigated.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted. The Thai Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), a sociodemographic questionnaire, and the Thai Visual Functioning Questionnaire 28 were administered to all participants. Associations were estimated using the Cox regression.

Results: Of the 86 participants, 12.8% and 8.1% screened positive for anxiety and depression, respectively. Predictors of an increase in both HADS-Anxiety and HADS-Depression scores comprised poor understanding of OIDs [adjusted relative probability (aRP) = 1.56; p = 0.021 and 1.59; p = 0.012, respectively], and low overall composite score (aRP = 1.45; p = 0.022 and 1.6; p = 0.002, respectively).

Conclusions: Approximately one-tenth of our patients screened positive for anxiety and depression. Patients with poor understanding of their OID and poor self-reported visual function were at an increased risk.

Keywords:

• Anxiety
• depression
• HADS
• ocular inflammation
• Thailand
• uveitis
• visual functioning

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Dr Alan Geater for his suggestions concerning the statistics used in this project. They also thank Ms Parichat Damthongsuk for her assistance in collecting and analyzing the data. Finally, they thank Mr Edmond Subashi for editing the English manuscript.

Declaration of Interest

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