Quality of Life in Patients Suffering from Bipolar Disorder

Abstract

Background: Patients with Bipolar Disorder (BD) suffer from poor quality of life (QOL) and impaired psychosocial functioning. Research indicates that the lowest quality of life scores were recorded during the depressed state followed by manic/hypomanic states while there was least impairment of quality of life in euthymic states. Objective: This study aims to determine the quality of life in individuals suffering from bipolar disorder. Methodology: The PRISMA Checklist 2020 was used as a protocol to conduct this systematic review. Databases such as PubMed, Cochrane, ClinicalTrail.gov, CINAHL, Embase, Science-direct and Google scholar were searched for the articles published between 2013 to 2023 using the keywords. The articles were uploaded on Mendley and duplicates were removed. The remaining articles were screened on the basis of title and abstract and then sought for retrieval. The retrieved articles were assessed for further eligibility. Following the application of inclusion and exclusion criteria, the final articles were obtained to be included in our systematic review for data extraction. Results: There is poor QOL in BD patients compared with general population. Psychological and physical domain of QOL are affected the most in BD. There is also a significant impact upon social domain and levels of independence. However, environmental and spiritual domains of QOL are least effected. Conclusions: In the past few years, major achievements in the pharmacological control of BD patients have been done, thus diverting our attention to increasing the quality of life of BD patients. Our systematic review chiefly gives information about how BD negatively affects QOL in all domains of life. In recent years bipolar disorder has become an important health concern not only for individuals with BD but also for our society, thus more studies evaluating QOL in bipolar disorder should be further conducted.