Searchable abstracts of presentations at key conferences in endocrinology
Endocrine Abstracts (2009) 20 P588

ECE2009 Poster Presentations Neuroendocrinology, Pituitary and Behaviour (74 abstracts)

Quality of life (QoL) in patients with Cushing's syndrome in a Spanish population: new experience with the CushingQoL questionnaire

Santos Alicia 1, , Resmini Eugenia 1, , Barahona M a José , Martí Camelia 1, , Farkas Cheryl 1 , Roig Olga 1, , Martínez M a Antonia , Sucunza Nuria 2 , Badia Xavier 2, & Webb Susan M 1,


1Hospital Sant Pau, Barcelona, Spain; 2CIBER-ER Unidad 747, Barcelona, Spain; 3Health Economics and Outcomes Research, IMS Health, Barcelona, Spain.


Quality of life is impaired in patients who have suffered Cushing’s syndrome (CS).

Aim: Evaluate QoL with the new questionnaire CushingQoL in Spanish patients in a clinical practice setting and compare it with a generic QoL questionnaire, EuroQoL-5 Dimensions (5D) and its Visual Analogue Scale (VAS).

Patients and methods: Forty-three patients with CS (38 pituitary-dependent, 28 cured) were approached during their regular endocrine follow-up and asked to complete the EuroQoL and CushingQoL questionnaires.

Results: Mean EuroQoL-VAS in patients with cured CS (69.7+19.4) did not differ from that of active CS patients (63.9+22.3), while the CushingQoL score was signifficantly worse in active patients (62.8+20.7 vs 45+17.6, P<0.01). A positive correlation was observed between both questionnaires, both for the whole group of patients (r=0.635), cured (r=0.643) and active CS patients (r=0.648). The only dimension of the EuroQoL-5D questionnaire which was significantly less affected in cured than in active patients was that which referred to Usual Activities (P<0.035).

Conclusions: With the disease-generated CushingQoL questionnaire, patients with active CS have a greater impairment of QoL than patients in whom hypercortisolemia has been controlled. No difference was seen when the generic EuroQoL-VAS was used. Therefore, the CushingQoL questionnaire is more sensitive than the generic tool used to identify dimensions important for QoL impairment in patients with CS in a clinical practice setting. Study supported in part by the ERCUSYN PHP 800200 project.

Article tools

My recent searches

No recent searches.