Is fatigue associated with short-term health-related quality of life in stroke?

UNLABELLED: Tang WK, Lu JY, Chen YK, Mok VC, Ungvari GS, Wong KS. Is fatigue associated with short-term health-related quality of life in stroke?
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the relation between poststroke fatigue and short-term health-related quality of life (HRQOL) in Chinese patients with first or recurrent stroke.
DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey.
SETTING: Acute stroke unit of a general hospital. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 458 patients with acute ischemic stroke admitted to the acute stroke unit of a university-affiliated regional hospital in Hong Kong.
INTERVENTIONS: Not applicable. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: HRQOL was assessed with the Medical Outcomes Study 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) at 3 months after the subjects' index stroke. Fatigue was evaluated by using the Fatigue Severity Scale (FSS). The correlation between the FSS and SF-36 scores was examined and adjusted for potential confounders, including age, sex, marital status, previous stroke, social support, global cognitive functions, neurologic deficits, and depressive symptoms.
RESULTS: Univariate analysis revealed that fatigue was a significant correlate of all SF-36 domain scores. The magnitude of correlation was highest for the vitality domain (r=-.605, Bonferroni corrected P<.05) and lowest for the physical functioning domain (r=-.202, Bonferroni corrected P<.05). Canonic correlation analysis indicated that FSS was strongly related to the HRQOL with a loading of -.678. Increasing fatigue was associated with a lower HRQOL. The association between FSS and HRQOL remained significant in the subsequent multivariate regression analysis, having adjusted for possible confounders.
CONCLUSIONS: These findings suggest that fatigue has an impact on short-term HRQOL in Chinese stroke patients. The early identification and treatment of fatigue may improve HRQOL of stroke patients.