HARTFORD, CT — Do multiple sclerosis patients with a vascular comorbidity such as hypertension, hyperlipidemia, heart disease and diabetes have more issues with functional activities, and how does that relate to disability, depression and fatigue?
Those were the questions asked in a recent study led by the Mandell Center for Multiple Sclerosis, Mount Sinai Rehabilitation Hospital, Trinity Health of New England in Hartford, CT. T The VA’s Multiple Sclerosis Center of Excellence West and the Rehabilitation Care Service at VA Puget Sound Health Care System, all in Seattle, participated in the study.
For the study published in Disability & Rehabilitation, 263 participants completed the Functional Status Index (FSI), which assessed five domains: gross mobility, hand activities, personal care, home chores and social/role activities. After bivariate analyses, individual linear regressions were conducted for each FSI domain, controlling for demographics, according to the researchers, who note that follow-up mediation analyses were done for each of the three mediators.1
The results indicated that participants with vascular comorbidities endorsed more issues on all five domains, with the demographic-adjusted associations with gross mobility (b = 0.34, p = 0.002), hand activities (b = 0.15, p = 0.006), home chores (b = 0.44, p = 0.003), and social/role activities (b = 0.32, p = 0.024) remaining significant.
“Disability fully mediated the effects of vascular comorbidities on these domains, with partial and full mediations observed with depression and fatigue. Diabetes emerged as a significant individual comorbidity in several models,” the authors explained, adding that “vascular comorbidities, diabetes in particular, are associated with persons with MS endorsing worse ratings on functional outcomes, with disability, depression, and fatigue explaining these associations.”
- Gromisch ES, Neto LO, Lo AC, DeLuca GC, Turner AP, Agresta T, Castiglione AS, DelMastro HM. The contributions of vascular comorbidities on self-reported functional issues in persons with multiple sclerosis. Disabil Rehabil. 2024 Dec 10:1-10. doi: 10.1080/09638288.2024.2438254. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 39655414.
