ABSTRACT

In epilepsy patients many factors affect the quality of the life and sleep. The determinations of these factors are important in the dimension of improving both quality of life and sleeping. The aim of our study is to examine how socio-economic and clinical variables might influence the quality of life and sleep in young male patients with epilepsy.

Participants were recruited from our outpatient clinic and diagnosed as epilepsy by a neurologist. Only male patients were included. All patients completed a semi-structured interview form for epilepsy patients as well as the Quality of Life in Epilepsy Inventory (QOLIE-31), the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and Pittsburgh Sleep Disorders Index (PSDI) under the supervision of the same neurology specialist. Finally, obtained test results in epilepsy patients were evaluated and examined the relationship among socio-economic and clinical factors.

The lowest score of the QOLIE-31 sub-scores of the patients were about “seizure concern”. Age, duration of the disease and drug use did not significantly effect the total scores of QOLIE-31, BDI and PSDI. QOLIE-31 total scores of patients with moderate-to-good level of economic status were better than the ones with poor economic status. Patients with frequent number of seizures had more concerns and burnout than the ones with rare number of seizures. Also sleep disorder scores were worse with the patients who had frequent seizures.

Epilepsy patients have high anxiety to have seizure. On the other hand low economic status, having frequent number of seizures, sleep disturbances and presence of depressive symptoms decrease the quality of life. Detection and correction of these factors would improve sleep and quality of life in these patients and also would increase treatment compliance and success.

Keywords: Exacerbation frequency, depressive symptoms, epilepsy, socioeconomic status, sleep disturbances, quality of life