Is perceived social support more important than visual acuity for clinical depression and anxiety in patients with age-related macular degeneration and diabetic retinopathy?

Objective: To investigate whether visual acuity has the same importance as a factor of depression and anxiety comparing with other psychological variables, particularly perceived social support, in patients diagnosed with age-related eye diseases, with and without low vision.

Design: Observational cross-sectional study.

Setting: Patients attending outpatient appointments at the department of ophthalmology of a general hospital in Portugal.

Subjects: Patients with age-related macular degeneration and patients with diabetic retinopathy attending routine hospital appointments were recruited for this study.

Measures: Anxiety and depression were measured using the hospital anxiety and depression scale and perceived social support using the multidimensional scale of perceived social support. Visual acuity was measured with ETDRS charts.

Results: Of the 71 patients, 53 (75%) were diagnosed with diabetic retinopathy, 37 (52%) were female and age (mean ± SD) was 69 ± 12 years. Acuity in the better seeing eye was 0.41 ± 0.33 logMAR. The mean anxiety score was 4.38 ± 3.82 and depression 4.41 ± 3.39. Clinically significant levels of anxiety were found in 21% ( = 15) of the participants and depression in 18%( = 13). The total social support score was 5.29 ± 0.61. Significant multivariate regression models were found for anxiety ( = 0.21,  = 0.016) and for depression ( = 0.32,  < 0.0001). Social support was independently associated with levels of anxiety and with levels of depression. Gender was independently associated with levels of anxiety.

Conclusion: This study suggests that patients' perceived social support might be more important than visual acuity as a factor of clinical depression and anxiety in a sample of age-related eye disease patients.