Childhood Trauma, Depression, Anxiety, Stress and Quality of Life in Women with Hashimoto’s Disease: Descriptive Research

Abstract

Objective: Hashimoto’s disease is the most common au- toimmune thyroid disease and the most common cause of hypothy- roidism. Recent studies demonstrate that many report significant impairment in quality of life (QOL) compared to controls of similar age and sex, even when they are adequately medically treated. As of yet, there are limited studies that have investigated this issue. The pre- sent study aimed to examine the unique contribution of childhood trauma, depression, anxiety and stress on QOL, among women with medically adequately treated Hashimoto’s disease. In route of this aim, the study also contributes to the Hashimoto’s disease literature available on childhood trauma and the associations between depression, anxiety, stress, childhood trauma and QOL. Material and Methods: Eighty three women (mean age=35.47±6.19 years) with well-controlled Hashimoto’s disease for ?6 months, filled out the World Health Orga- nization Quality of Life Questionnaire, Childhood Trauma Question- naire-33, Depression Anxiety Stress-21 scale and a sociodemographic form. Data was analyzed via correlation and simple linear regression. Results: Emotional neglect and OP-OC were the most commonly re- ported childhood traumas among women with Hashimoto’s disease, but only emotional neglect (p?0.05) and emotional abuse (p?0.01) signif- icantly negatively correlated with QOL. Depression (11.8%) and stress (9.8%,) were the only variables to explain the variance in QOL. Finally, stress was significantly negatively correlated with QOL, and OP-OC was significantly positively correlated with stress (p ?0.05). Conclu- sion: Emotional abuse, emotional neglect, depression and stress must be considered in terms of QOL in women diagnosed with Hashimoto’s disease. Suggestions for future studies are discussed.