Evaluation of vascular quality of life questionnaire in dialysis patients with peripheral arterial disease treated by low-density lipoprotein apheresis

Background Peripheral arterial disease (PAD) is a common complication in dialysis patients. Early diagnosis and treatment are recommended. Low-density lipoprotein apheresis (LDL-A) is a potential therapy to improve PAD. However, the mechanism has yet to be fully clarified due to lack of established quantitative methods to assess the therapeutic effects of LDL-A treatment. Improvement of skin perfusion pressure (SPP) or ankle brachial index (ABI) is a representative therapy goal, but clinical symptoms were not always consistent with the values of SPP/ABI. Vascular quality of life questionnaire (VascuQOL) was proposed as a disease-specific QOL score, getting validated recently. The possibility of VascuQOL to reflect the severity of PAD in dialysis patients and evaluate the therapeutic effects of LDL-A has yet to be elucidated.