Quality of life evaluation of children with type 1 Diabetes mellitus

Abstract

This study described the quality of life of children with type 1 diabetes as an outpatient. This is an observational study of cross-sectional survey carried out with 22 children from 8 to 12 years old, regularly treated at the Attendance of Pediatric Endocrinology, Hospital de Clinicas, of Universidade Federal do Triângulo Mineiro (HC-UFTM) and their caregivers. Quality of life was evaluated by the generic questionnaire on pediatric quality of life (PedsQL 4.0) and the sociodemographic and clinical data were collected through medical records. By analyzing the scores of quality of life, higher scores in all domains of PedsQL 4.0 for the report of patients related to the caregivers were observed. The main factors which influenced the quality of life were: nutritional counseling and physical activity. It was found that most children had difficulty performing home control of diabetes due to lack of financial resources. Diabetes requires daily control and patient's consciousness regarding responsibility during the treatment in order to avoid hospitalization and complications, since the disease under control enables the patient to have a normal daily life avoiding suffering on the part of the patient and the family as well.