| [ Summary ] |
Recent studies of the characteristics of diseases show that the number of acute diseases is decreasing, whereas, the number of chronic diseases is increasing. This means that health related QOL, which is the style of life while living with diseases, has become very important. Recently, QOL has been measured quantiatively by several methods, such as PGWB, SF-36 or GSRS and has been applied to the assessment of the severity of diseases or drug efficacy. Decrease in GERD has been said to be the factor which most severely impairs QOL.However, GERD not only impairs QOL but patients who are going to undergo endoscopy have low QOL scores, as well. Their QOL is lower than that of patients with mild heart failure or angina, before surgery. Compared to patients with hypertension, diabetes mellitus or depression, GERD patients have lower QOL in relation to bodily pain, role limitation-physical and social functioning, as seen by using SF-36. QOL assessment is especially important in endoscopically negative GERD patients, who cannot utilize endoscopic evaluation. The severity of symptoms correlated with the QOL score. Some studies disclosing use of proton pump inhibitors showed significant QOL improvements, compared to control groups. Thus, QOL measurements have become very important methods to assess GERD patients. |