Evaluation of disease-specific quality of life and its influencing factors in Bulgarian patients with Graves'...

Graves' orbitopathy (GO) profoundly affects patients' quality of life (QoL). Our aim was to assess QoL in patients with different forms of GO and to search for predictors of QoL.

This was a cross-sectional study involving 221 consecutive unselected GO patients (77.4% females, mean age 52 ± 11.6) referred to our clinic in the period 2017-2021. Detailed medical history was obtained from all patients, followed by hormonal and immunological testing and comprehensive ocular status. QoL was assessed by a disease-specific questionnaire (GO-QoL), consisting of two scales-one related to visual functioning (QoL-VF) and the other-to physical appearance (QoL-AP). The results were calculated by formula and expressed as percentages.

Mild GO patients had significantly higher scores on both scales of GO-QoL compared to moderate-to-severe and sight-threatening GO patients (82.0 vs. 54.6% and 27.3% for QoL-VF; 70.1 vs. 54.4% and 36.9% for QoL-AP). Patients with active GO had significantly poorer QoL-VF (56.6 vs. 76.6%) and QoL-AP (53.1 vs. 67.5%) in comparison to patients with inactive GO. The stepwise linear regression analysis showed that the variables with major predictive value for QoL-VF were: CAS, diplopia score, visual acuity and severity of the symptoms (R² = 0.44), whereas gender, CAS, diplopia score and proptosis best predicted QoL-AP (R² = 0.39).

The impact of GO on patients' QoL depends on the severity and activity of the disease. The clinical predictors of the impairment of QoL should be taken into account when considering the optimal adjunctive treatment approaches aiming to improve patients' QoL.