Patient counseling for chronic liver disease patients with anxiety and depression: A cross-sectional study

Abstract

Anxiety and depression were interlinked with the severity of liver diseases. Patients should know the true severity of the disease and patient counseling helps them. This was a cross-sectional study carried out on 100 patients suffering from chronic liver disease. Child Turcotte Pugh score was used to calculate the severity of the disease. Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale was used to calculate the anxiety and depression of patients. Non-parametric tests are used to find out the association. The level of significance was p < 0.05. The mean age group of patients was 47.29 ± 13.17 years. The three most presenting clinical signs and symptoms according to their occurrence was abdominal pain (74%), edema (58%), and ascites (51%). The median Child Turcotte Pugh score was 9 corresponds to class B. We observed highly significant association (p < 0.01) between total bilirubin (p < 0.0001), albumin (p < 0.0001), and the severity and prognosis of the disease. We observed a higher percentage of patients with borderline abnormal anxiety (61%) and depression (51%) in our study. High-risk patients were made aware of the severity of the disease and consequences thereafter, provided with patient counseling along with a list of deaddiction centers. Integrating a psychologist can benefit patients struggling with deaddiction of alcohol.