Health-Related Quality of Life after Pancreatic Islet Transplantation: A Longitudinal Study

Abstract

PIT recipients have less anxiety about the symptoms and consequences of hypoglycemia. PIT recipients also indicate that their behavior requires significantly less modification to prevent or treat hypoglycemia after PIT compared with before PIT. Further investigation is needed to determine whether PIT improves generic measures of HRQL.

Improved Metabolic Control and Quality of Life in Seven Patients With Type 1 Diabetes Following Islet After Kidney Transplantation

“…This is in agreement with previous observations (3,60,61). Notably, the DQOL impact and worry scores showed sustained improvement associated with an islet transplant, despite the need for exogenous insulin to maintain adequate metabolic control.…”

Impact of Islet Transplantation on Diabetes Complications and Quality of Life

“…Patients with insulin independence or partial graft function similarly report reduction of hypoglycemic episodes, improvement of symptom awareness, and the re-discovering of reliability and independence [56]; moreover, hypoglycemia-related fear is not experienced after a full or partial functioning islet transplantation [55,57,58]. As expected, insulinindependent patients felt less fear than those who remained or returned to insulin [55,57].…”

“…Patients with insulin independence or partial graft function similarly report reduction of hypoglycemic episodes, improvement of symptom awareness, and the re-discovering of reliability and independence [56]; moreover, hypoglycemia-related fear is not experienced after a full or partial functioning islet transplantation [55,57,58]. As expected, insulinindependent patients felt less fear than those who remained or returned to insulin [55,57]. Teran-Escandon et al evaluated the QoL and diabetes-specific QoL (DQoL) (two useful indexes for measuring physical and psychological well-being) in 10 patients before and after islet transplantation, using the Quality of Life Enjoyment and Satisfaction Questionnaire Short Form (Q-LESQ-SF) [59,60].…”

Quality of Life After Islet Transplantation

“…A recent report on QOL in a small group of patients that were followed up for 12 months suggested that while hypoglycemia fear improved significantly after transplant, all scores of the SF 36 questionnaire did not (20). This is quite consistent with our observations obtained in a larger group of patients and with a longer follow-up; it is therefore conceivable that rather than an improvement in general health related QOL, diabetes-specific aspects of QOL are more likely to show benefit from an islet transplant.…”

“…Also we believe that, in addition to the psychometric instruments utilized for this study, the use of a hypoglycemia-fear specific questionnaire would be very useful to capture the fundamental benefit for a patient with type 1 diabetes that receives an islet transplant (20).…”