SynthesisAnaesthesia2019
Changes in health-related quality of life after discharge from an intensive care unit: a systematic review.
Synthesis in Anaesthesia, 2019. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 70 papers, 4 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
70 citing papers in PubMed, 4 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Health-Related Quality of Life of Adult Sepsis Survivors Following Critical Illness: A Systematic Review.Critical care explorations · 2025Pooled it
- Effect of intensive care unit diary on quality of life of intensive care unit survivors and their relatives: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Nursing open · 2023Pooled it
- Biomarkers for assessing acute kidney injury for people who are being considered for admission to critical care: a systematic review and cost-effectiveness analysis.Health technology assessment (Winchester, England) · 2022Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Effects of a brief primary care intervention for post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms after critical illness on health-related quality of life - A secondary analysis of the PICTURE randomised controlled trial.The European journal of general practice · 2026Trial
- Depressive symptoms are a key determinant of health-related quality of life in ICU survivors with psychological distress.Scientific reports · 2026Trial
- Trial
- Health-related quality of life correlates with patient-reported and proxy-reported disability in critical illness survivors: a secondary analysis of the ERIC trial.Critical care (London, England) · 2025Trial
- Trial
- Cognitive Health and Quality of Life After Surviving Sepsis: A Narrative Review.Journal of intensive care medicine · 2026Review
- Impaired Pre-Critical Illness Quality of Life in Elderly ICU Patients.Acta anaesthesiologica Scandinavica · 2026Observational
- Distinct Health-Related Quality of Life Recovery Trajectories Among ICU Survivors: A Multicentre Prospective Cohort Study Using the EQ-5D-5L.Nursing in critical care · 2026Observational
- Measuring health-related quality of life in sepsis survivors and caregivers: a mapping review and a preliminary conceptual framework.Quality of life research : an international journal of quality of life aspects of treatment, care and rehabilitation · 2026Review
- Article
- Opportunities to Improve Nutrition for Patients in Hospital After Discharge From an Intensive Care Unit: A Human Factors Analysis.Nursing in critical care · 2026Article
- Web-Based Group Photovoice Through the Lens of Survivors of Critical Illness Recovery: Photovoice Qualitative Pilot Study.JMIR formative research · 2026Article
- Health-Related Quality of Life and Mobility Levels in ICU Survivors with Heel Pressure Ulcer: An Observational Study.Nursing reports (Pavia, Italy) · 2026Article
- The role of family caregivers in critical illness survivor recovery at home: A qualitative study.Journal of health services research & policy · 2026Article
- Non-pharmacological post-intensive care interventions to improve patient outcome following critical illness: a scoping review.Critical care (London, England) · 2025Review
- Metabolomic biomarkers predict long-term physical function in survivors of acute respiratory failure.Respiratory research · 2025Article
10 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
Abstract
Quality of life after critical illness is becoming increasingly important as survival improves. Various measures have been used to study the quality of life of patients discharged from intensive care. We systematically reviewed validated measures of quality of life and their results. We searched PubMed, CENTRAL, CINAHL, Web of Science and Open Grey for studies of quality of life, measured after discharge from intensive care. We categorised studied populations as: general; restricted to level-3 care or critical care beyond 5 days; and septic patients. We included quality of life measured at any time after hospital discharge. We identified 48 studies. Thirty-one studies used the Medical Outcomes Study 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) and 19 used the EuroQol-5D (EQ-5D); eight used both and nine used alternative validated measures. Follow-up rates ranged from 26-100%. Quality of life after critical care was worse than for age- and sex-matched populations. Quality of life improved for one year after hospital discharge. The aspects of life that improved most were physical function, physical role, vitality and social function. However, these domains were also the least likely to recover to population norms as they were more profoundly affected by critical illness.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.