Association between Clinical Characteristics and Quality of Life in Older People with Stroke at Hospital Discharge

Objective: The number of people with stroke increases worldwide. The stroke survivors live with disabilities and those influence their quality of life (QOL). This study was aimed to investigate the association between clinical characteristics and QOL of the older people with stroke at discharge from the hospital. Methods: This is a cross-sectional study. The participants were 113 stroke survivors aged 60 years and older admitted to the stroke unit. Quality of life was the study’s outcome which measured by using the abbreviated version of the World Health Organization Quality of Life (WHOQOL-BREF). Primary clinical characteristics were measured by the National Institute of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS), Barthel Index (BI), and Modified Rankin Scale (mRS). Potential confounding factors were age, sex, education levels, marital status, current occupation, and comorbidity (hypertension, diabetes mellitus, dyslipidemia, and heart disease). Multiple linear regression was used for data analysis. Results: The main effects of clinical outcomes were high BI Score that had a significant difference association with QOL (β = 0.312, 95% CI = 0.042, 0.296, P = 0.009), lower mRS score also had significant difference association with QOL (β= -0.371, 95%CI = LJ.394, ǃ.162, P = 0.003) after all adjusting. Additional risk factor in this study was marital status (currently married) (β= 0.155, 95% CI = 0.226, 8.666, P = 0.039). Conclusion: Low function status and severe stroke disability as the clinical characteristics were associated with QOL in older people with stroke at hospital discharge. An additional factor was marital status (currently married).