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Large ASD burden warrants global attention
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LYON, France — Patients with adult spinal deformity scored lower on all domains of the SF-36 than patients with self-reported chronic conditions such as arthritis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes and hypertension, according to the results of a study that was the winner of the 2014 EuroSpine Full Paper Award at the EuroSpine Annual Meeting, here.
The investigators, who were part of the European Spine Study Group (ESSG), collected baseline SF-36 scores for 504 patients with adult spinal deformity (ASD) and compared the scores with those of 24,936 people from eight industrialized countries who participated in the International Quality of Life Assessment (IQoLA) Project and had self-reported arthritis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes mellitus and hypertension.
“Adult spinal deformity patients scored significantly lower than any of the four subreported chronic conditions with highest impact on PCS [physical component score] assessed in the IQoLA project,” Ferran Pellisé, MD, who presented the findings, said.
The patients with ASD were enrolled in the ESSG prospective, multicenter, international database, were older than 18 years of age and had scoliosis greater than 20°. They had a sagittal vertical axis greater than 5 cm, pelvic tilt greater than 25° or thoracic kyphosis that exceeded 60°.
ASD had the highest impact on the bodily pain domain of the SF-36 score compared with individuals who reported having no medical condition. This produced a large effect size of greater than −30, and the corresponding difference in the effect size was “very large” at more than 0.1 and 0.3, respectively, according to Pellisé.
Pellisé and colleagues also used the American Society of Anesthesiologists Physical Status Classification System (ASA) to evaluate the impact of comorbidities on the quality of life of surgical patients. When they stratified patients in this group by ASA score, they found surgical patients who did not have associated comorbidities and were ASA grade 1 still scored significantly worse than those who reported no medical conditions or other chronic conditions, Pellisé said.
“Our conclusions are that the global burden of adult spinal deformity is large compared with other self-reported current conditions in the general population. Low ASD health-related quality-of-life scores are not just the result of additional comorbidities, and we believe that the impact of ASD on health-related quality of life warrants the same research and health policy attention as other important chronic diseases,” he said.
Reference:
Pellisé F, et al. Impact on health-related quality of life of adult spinal deformity (ASD) compared with other chronic conditions. Presented at: EuroSpine Annual Meeting; Oct. 1-3, 2014; Lyon, France.
Disclosure: Pellisé has no relevant financial disclosures.