Abstract
Depression and stress have been related with poor Health Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) prognosis. However, it is not clear when these depressive symptoms should be measured. A sample of 177 Coronary Heart Disease patients were followed for 15 months aimed to compare the effect of depression and stress measure at time of hospitalization and three months later on the physical HRQoL trajectory. Linear growth models’ results showed that depression and stress after discharge are negatively correlated with the physical HRQoL and depressive symptoms negatively affect the prognosis of these patients.
Keywords:
depression; stress; quality of life; heart disease; linear growth models
Thumbnail
Note: n = 177; i = intercept of physical quality of life; s = slope of physical quality of life; Dep1 = depression three months after hospitalization; St1 = stress three months after hospitalization; hrqol from 1 to 4, physical quality of life measured every three months after hospitalization. Paths from the i to each hrqol measurement fixed at 1 as default in linear growth models. Paths from s to hrqol measurements were numbered from 1 to 4 to specify a linear growth model with equidistant time points. * significant at the p <.05 level; ** significant at the p <.01.