Quality of life in patients with bipolar I disorder: is it related to disorder outcome?

Bipolar I disorder (BID) and its treatments have shown to be associated with deep impacts on patients' subjective feelings and quality of life (QOL). There are also some comments about impact of these feelings on course and outcome of patients with BID. This study was aimed to evaluate quality of life in patients with BID and to assess its relationship with course of disorder. Fifty patients with BID were recruited based on the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV Axis I Disorders (SCID-I) from May 2008 and followed for 12 months. Quality of life and mood disorder recurrence were assessed through World Health Organization Quality of Life and SCID-I tools respectively at baseline and after 6 and 12 months. Repeated measures analysis and logistic regression were used to analyze the independent effect of QOL and demographic factors on BID recurrence. Fifty patients (66% male; 48% never married; 48% in primary school level) with mean ± SE age and age of BID onset 33.8±1.5 and 26.6±1.1 years were studied. They had 3.4±0.6 episodes already. Twenty eight percent suffered from recurrences during the follow-up. The QOL scores at baseline, after 6 and 12 months were 70±1.8, 69.6±1.1 and 73±1.3 respectively. There were no significant change in QOL and its sub-domains during the follow-up (P=0.37). QOL showed no independent relationship with BID recurrences (P>0.1). No change in the QOL during the follow-up could denote lack of effectiveness of routine interventions on this factor. Also, short-term follow-up might be concerned as the possible reason. Of prime importance is to consider quality of life independently in treating patients with bipolar disorder.

Bipolar Disorder Patients Follow-up (BDPF): methods and materials.

BACKGROUND: The Bipolar Disorder Patients Follow-up (BDPF) project is a longitudinal, prospective and naturalistic study. The purpose of the present report is to introduce the project, elaborate its methods, and present the reliability data of the utilized symptoms rating scales. METHODS: The sampling started in May 2008 and is still in progress. The probands are assessed at the beginning of the sampling and then 2 and 6 months later and then every 6 months using several instruments to identify psychiatric comorbidities, symptoms severity, quality of life, attempted suicide rate, treatment compliance, and some other factors. RESULTS: The results could lead to increase the clinicians' awareness about the clinical picture of this disorder in Iranian patients. CONCLUSIONS: The present project could decrease to some extent the current shortcomings in Iran's psychiatric data at least about one of the major psychiatric disorders known as the eighth result which cause medical disability over the world.