Prevalence of Depression and Anxiety in Chronic Respiratory Disease Patients Attending Pulmonology Department of a Tertiary Care Hospital: A Cross-Sectional Study

A BSTRACT Background: Depression and anxiety are common in patients with advanced respiratory diseases, which are often underdiagnosed. Comorbid depression and anxiety are usually associated with increased disability, poor compliance with medical treatment, heightened healthcare utilization, and premature mortality. There is a shortage of Indian studies in this area. Aim: To study the prevalence of depression and anxiety in patients with chronic respiratory diseases attending the pulmonology department of a tertiary care hospital. Materials and Methods: By convenience sampling, this hospital-based cross-sectional observational study included consenting patients with chronic respiratory diseases attending OPD at the pulmonology department in a tertiary care hospital. Patients who already had a previous diagnosis of psychiatric illness were excluded. A sociodemographic profile was collected by using a semistructured questionnaire. Then, the Hamilton Depression and Hamilton Anxiety Rating scales were applied to them. Data were entered into an MS Excel sheet and analyzed using the SPSS 24.0 version. Results: In this study, about 28% of TB patients were suffering from mild anxiety, while severe anxiety was noticed in 42.9% of chronic bronchitis patients and 50% of bronchial asthma patients. Severe depression was seen in 62.5% of chronic bronchitis patients, followed by 37.5% of TB patients, indicating that there is a statistical significance between depression and chronic respiratory diseases. Conclusion: There is a high prevalence of depression and anxiety in patients suffering from chronic respiratory diseases. Anxiety was most commonly seen in bronchial asthma patients, followed by chronic bronchitis patients. Depression was most common in chronic bronchitis patients, followed by patients with tuberculosis.