Abstract
This study was conducted to assess the health-related quality of life (QOL) of children and adolescents with type 1 diabetes by comparing it to healthy controls as a means of clarifying the psychosocial and general health status of children and adolescents with type 1 diabetes in Japan.
This study investigated whether health-related QOL is associated with HbA1c, frequency of insulin injection, and duration of diabetes.
Data were collected by using two original health-related QOL questionnaires: one for children attending elementary school and junior high school and the other for high school students. A total of 736 responses were received from diabetic children and adolescents aged 9 to 18 years (n=368) and age-and sex-matched healthy controls (n=368).
The results indicated that the health-related QOL of the type 1 diabetics was higher than that of the healthy controls. Elementary and junior high school children with diabetes had significantly higher total QOL scores, and had many sub-scale scores that were higher than in the healthy controls. However, the only one QOL sub-scale score of the diabetic high school students was significantly higher than that in the healthy controls. And the diabetic students in their second year of high school had even lower total QOL scores than the healthy controls. The QOL values of the diabetic students in their third year of high school were little improved. We suspect that the lower QOL observed in diabetic high school students might be indicative of increased anxiety regarding their future and the expense they might incur as a result of their condition.
Good metabolic control in diabetic children and adolescents was associated with good health-related QOL. Duration of diabetes was not associated with health-related QOL. Frequency of insulin injection by high school students was not associated with health-related QOL, but elementary school children and junior high school children who injected insulin twice a day had significantly lower anxiety than those who injected insulin four times a day.
