Anxiety, depression and emotional profile in renal transplant recipients and healthy subjects: a comparative study

Renal transplantation is a well established treatment for end-stage renal disease. However, recipients have been shown to develop emotional distress and affective disorders, such as anxiety and depression, associated with a compromised quality of life. Some accounts report an improvement of affective disorders after transplantation, others draw opposite conclusion.

The present cross-sectional study selected 42 transplant recipients and 42 control subjects matched for gender, age, educational background, and marital status. Symptoms of anxiety, depression and general emotional profiles were compared using the Zung Self-Rating Anxiety Scale, the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and the Affective Neuroscience Personality Scale (ANPS), a self-report inventory that evaluates 6 neurally based affective tendencies: seeking, caring, and playfulness (positive affects) and fear, anger, and sadness (negative affects).

No significant differences were observed between transplanted patients and controls in scores for anxiety and depression, as evaluated with Zung and BDI scales. However, transplanted patients scored significantly lower than control subjects in fear and anger scales and in general negative emotions. Transplant recipients did not display any symptom of anxiety or depression, however, a significant reduction in negative affect, evaluated through the ANPS scale revealed psychological distress.

These findings suggest that affective profile in transplanted patients should be more extensively examined to review all facets in their mental and emotional assessment, especially regarding the role played by this emotional pattern in complying with medical treatment, which is well known to be a clinically critical feature of these patients.