Health-related quality of life 6 months after pediatric intensive care unit admission for bronchiolitis: a prospective single-center cohort study

• Published in: European journal of pediatrics Vol. 182; no. 1; pp. 403 - 409
• Main Authors: van Dijk, Tessel, van Benthum, Milou V., Maas-van Schaaijk, Nienke M., van Zwol, Annelies
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.01.2023; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Appetite; Bronchiolitis - therapy; Bronchopneumonia; Child; Child, Preschool; Children; Cohort analysis; Cohort Studies; Humans; Infant; Intensive care; Intensive Care Units, Pediatric; Length of Stay; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Patients; Pediatrics; Prospective Studies; Quality of Life; Retrospective Studies; Stomach; Critical illness; HRQoL; PICU; Bronchiolitis; Follow-up
• ISSN: 1432-1076; 0340-6199; 1432-1076
• DOI: 10.1007/s00431-022-04700-8

Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL) after Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) admission is considered a valuable outcome measure. Yet, data on HRQoL after PICU admission are scarce and often collected in heterogeneous patient groups. The current study aimed to evaluate HRQoL in children with bronchiolitis 6 months after PICU admission, which represents a homogenous patient group. This study was conducted at the Radboud University Medical Centre in the Netherlands. Children admitted to the PICU between November 2019 and April 2020 were eligible. HRQoL was assessed with the “TNO-AZL Preschool children Quality of Life” (TAPQOL) questionnaire and compared to Dutch normative data. Lower scores represent worse HRQoL. HRQoL was assessed in 34 children (response rate 81%), mean age at assessment was 7.6 months (SD 2.5 months), and median length of stay was 5 days (range 1–17). Parents reported significant lower scores on stomach problems ( p  < 0.001; d  = 0.8) and lung problems ( p  < 0.001; d  = 1.2) and significant higher scores on appetite ( p  < 0.001; d  = 0.6) and problem behavior ( p  < 0.001; d  = 0.5) compared to normative data. Effect sizes were moderate to large. Conclusion : Significant differences in several HRQoL domains were found after PICU admission for bronchiolitis compared to normative data. Whereas the domains lung and stomach problems showed significantly impaired scores, most domains revealed HRQoL levels comparable with healthy peers. This study may contribute to the optimization of HRQoL PICU outcomes by highlighting specific HRQoL domains to focus on at admission and during follow-up. What is Known: • With the decline in PICU mortality, HRQoL became an important outcome measure. Yet, the currently limited number of studies on HRQoL outcomes often involve heterogeneous patient groups. • Bronchiolitis is one of the most frequent reasons for PICU admission, and although a significant part of children admitted for bronchiolitis has a medical history, compared with other reasons for PICU admission, this patient group is relatively homogeneous in terms of age, disease course, and treatment. What is New: • In the present study, six months after PICU admission for bronchiolitis, children scored differently on multiple HRQoL domains compared to healthy peers. • Significantly impaired HRQoL scores were reported on lung and stomach problems in comparison to normative data.