Anxiety and depression in patients with gastroesophageal reflux disease and their effect on quality of life

Table 1 Patient demographics and clinical data (n = 379)

	Healthy controls	RE patients	NERD patients
n	100	134	145
Gender (M/F)1	49/51	71/63	66/79
mean age (yr)2	40.04 ± 12.22	41.07 ± 10.61	39.68 ± 10.80
Age range (yr)	19-67	23-68	16-71

¹No significant differences were observed among the three groups with respect to age (F = 0.574; P = 0.564);

²The constituent ratios of gender showed no significant differences among the three groups (χ² = 1.554; P = 0.460). RE: Reflux esophagitis; NERD: Non-erosive reflux disease.

Table 2 Characteristics of anxiety symptoms according to the Zung self-rating anxiety scale n (%)

Group	Normal	Mild to moderate	Severe	Extreme
Healthy control	86 (86)	13 (13)	1 (1)	0 (0)
RE	61 (45.52)	59 (44.03)	14 (10.44)	0 (0)
NERD	49 (33.79)	72 (49.66)	24 (16.55)	0 (0)

Compared with the healthy controls, the constituent ratios of the RE and the NERD groups were significantly different (χ² = 40.829, 66.222; P < 0.001, 0.001, respectively). The results of the RE group were similar to those of the NERD group (χ² = 4.805; P = 0.091). RE: Reflux esophagitis; NERD: Non-erosive reflux disease.

Table 3 Characteristics of anxiety symptoms according to the Zung self-rating depression scale n (%)

SDS	Normal	Mild to moderate	Severe	Extreme
Healthy, control	80 (86)	11 (13)	8 (1)	1 (0)
RE	42 (31.34)	43 (32.09)	26 (19.40)	23 (17.16)
NERD	32 (22.07)	38 (26.21)	35 (24.14)	40 (27.59)

Compared with the healthy controls, the constituent ratios of the RE and the NERD groups presented a significant difference (χ² = 35.14, 64.582; P < 0.001, 0.001, respectively). The results of the RE group were similar to those of the NERD group (χ² = 6.556; P = 0.085). RE: Reflux esophagitis; NERD: Non-erosive reflux disease.