A Cross-Sectional Study on the Prevalence of Depression and its Impact on the Quality of Life in Patients with OCD

Abstract

Background: Obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) is a debilitating neuropsychiatric disorder affecting approximately 1–3% of the population, at some point in their lifetime, and is characterized by recurrent intrusive ideas, impulses, or images (obsessions) along with overt or covert behaviors (compulsions) aimed at reducing the distress of obsessions. Aim: To study the impact of depression on the quality of life in patients with OCD. Methods: It was a hospital based, observational and cross-sectional study conducted in the Outpatient Department of psychiatry, Mental Health Institute, SCB Medical College, Cuttack.  The study was a time limited, single-centre study carried out from September 2018 to August 2019. Considering previous similar studies, the number of patients attending our OPD and from the previous statistics, the total sample size was taken to be 100. The study comprised of 100 untreated OCD patients, who were chosen through purposive sampling. Results: It was found that both obsession and compulsion affect quality of life negatively, obsession significantly affects physical well-being, psychological well- being as well as social relationships whereas compulsions significantly affect psychological well-being and social relationships. When different domains of QoL were correlated with severity of depression and it was found that all domains had negative correlation with severity of depression which was statistically significant i.e., depression negatively affects physical and psychological well-being, social relationships, and environmental health. The highest level of impairment was seen in psychological well-being. On comparing quality of life of OCD patients with and without depression it was found that those with comorbid depression had significantly poor quality of life in all of the quality-of-life domains than OCD patients without comorbid depression suggesting that comorbid depression is a strong predictor of poor quality of life in OCD patients. Conclusion: OCD has a profound impact not only on the patients but also the caregivers. In order to truly understand the effect of OCD on the patient population, one must take into account not only the disabling symptoms but also examine the overall ability of the patients to enjoy their life.

Keywords: Depression, QoL, OCD.