Review: Quality of life in lower limb peripheral vascular surgery

Purpose: Vascular intervention studies generally consider patency and limb salvage as primary outcomes. However, quality of life is increasingly considered an important patient-oriented outcome measurement of vascular interventions. Existing literature was analyzed to determine the effect of different treatments on quality of life for patients suffering from either claudication or critical limb ischemia.
Basic methods: A review of the literature was undertaken in the Medline library. A search was performed on quality of life in peripheral arterial disease. Results were stratified according to treatment groups.
Principal findings: Twenty-one articles described quality of life in approximately 4600 patients suffering from peripheral arterial disease. Invasive treatment generally results in better quality of life scores (at a maximum of 2 years of follow-up), compared with non-invasive treatment. In patients with critical limb ischemia, successful revascularization improves quality of life scores. Only one study reported long-term results.
Conclusions: Increase in quality of life scores can be found for any intervention performed for peripheral arterial disease. However, there is scarce information on long-term quality of life after vascular intervention.