The relationship between anemia and health-related QoL in patients with chronic kidney disease receiving hemodialysis treatment

Authors : Canan Emiroğlu, Ebru Gök Oğuz, Mehmet Deniz Aylı

Pages : 232-238

View : 15 | Download : 8

Publication Date : 2025-06-18

Article Type : Research Paper

Abstract :Aims: Anemia is a frequent complication in hemodialysis patients and associated with a poor quality of life (QoL). Our goal was to examine the connection between anemia and health-related QoL (HR-QoL) in those with renal failure receiving hemodialysis treatment. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, 128 subjects that underwent hemodialysis volunteered. Demographic, clinical, and laboratory parameters and QoL using SF-12 were assessed. Socio-demographic characteristics in patients with and without anemia according to hemoglobin value were compared. The scores obtained from the physical (PCS12) and mental subscales (MCS12) of the SF-health survey were compared with other variables (age, gender, education, smoking, marital status, comorbidity, BMI, duration of hemodialysis, hemoglobin values). Regression analyses were conducted using PCS12 and MCS12 as the independent variables. Results: There were 27 (21.1%) patients with Hb values between 10-11 and 38 (29.7%) patients with Hb values below 10. The findings of this study indicated that an early age (p=0.001) and higher education (p=0.009) were linked to improved QoL, while no association was found with anemia (p=0.228). Smoking was also found to be significant (p=0.01) for better scores. Univariate linear regression analysis was performed to evaluate the interaction or relationship between age and smoking. Smoking was found to be an effective risk factor in patients younger than 65 years, but not in patients older than 65 years. The comparison of socio-demographic characteristics between patients with and without anemia revealed that married patients exhibited statistically significant higher hemoglobin levels (p=0.001). Conclusion: A notable association was identified between the physical aspect of the SF-12 survey and both younger age and higher educational level, whereas no such relationship was observed for the mental aspect. The findings indicated that younger individuals with higher education levels experienced an improved physical QoL. However, no link has been found between anemia and QoL.
Keywords : chronic kidney disease, chronic renal failure, hemodialysis, anemia, health-related quality of life

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