Quality of Life in Disabled Versus Able-Bodied Individuals during COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Background: COVID-19 pandemic emerged in China, Wuhan in December, 2019. This pandemic has affected most domains of quality of life (QoL) for all individuals.  Objective: The aim of this study was to assess the quality of life among disabled persons and healthy-normal individuals during COVID-19 pandemic to compare it with their QoL before COVID-19 pandemic, in Jordan. Methods: Six hundred and thirty nine able-bodied participants (33.8 ± 11.3 years) and 143 disabled individuals (46.8 ± 16.4 years) completed the WHOQOL-BREF (a tool used to measure Quality of life) which is consisted of 24 items distributed in four domains (physical health, psychology, social relationships and environment) and 2 items on overall quality of life and general health. The survey was distributed to participants online through social media (WhatsApp, Facebook, emails) between 12th June and 18th July 2021.  Results: Quality of life values were higher in able-bodied participants for physical health (65.5 ± 16.3 vs. 56.2 ± 19.8), social relationships 63.2 ± 19.7 vs. 55.3 ± 21.1) and environment (53.6 ± 16.6 vs. 49.8 ± 17.9) domains. The quality of life correlated positively with individuals’ income for both groups and higher in all domains for physically active compared to non-physically active participants. Screen time significantly increased during COVID-19 for both groups. Conclusion: The authors recommended that more attention should be paid to all items of quality of life during COVID-19, particularly with regard to disabled persons, and to potential deleterious effects which may result from sedentary lifestyle behavior such as higher screen time usage during COVID-19.