Abstract:

Objective To investigate the prognosis of diabetes mellitus（DM）patients complicated by postherpetic neuralgia（PHN）and analyze the risk factors affecting the poor prognosis of PHN patients. Methods Fifty⁃five patients with DM complicated with PHN in the department of pain of our hospital were enrolled as an exposed group（group D）and another 56 patients with non⁃DM PHN were set as an unexposed group（group N） during the same period. Both groups received the oral drug therapy combined with the thoracic paravertebral therapy by ultrasound ⁃guided pulsed radiofrequency. The two groups were compared in terms of the scores of Numerical Rating Scale（NRS），Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale（HADS），Self⁃rating Scale of Sleep（SRSS）before and after treatment. The amount of consumed analgesic medication and the incidence of total adverse reactions in the two groups were recorded. The Logistic regression analysis was used to determine the factors affecting the prog⁃ nosis of the PHN patients. Results The scores of NRS，HADS，SRSS in both groups after treatment decreased significantly as compared to the scores before treatment（P < 0.05）. Compared with group N，the scores of NRS， HADS，SRSS in group D were significantly higher than those in group N（P < 0.05）at all the time points but 1 week after treatment. The amount of consumed analgesic medication and the incidence of total adverse reactions in group D were significantly higher than those in group N（P < 0.05）. The Logistic regression analysis showed that the risk of poor prognosis in the PHN patients complicated with DM was 3.16 times higher than that in non⁃DM patients（95%CI：1.28 ~ 7.80，P < 0.05）. Besides，the duration of postherpetic neuralgia was significantly associ⁃ ated with an increased risk of poor diagnosis（95%CI：1.14 ~ 1.85，P < 0.05）. Conclusion DM and duration of PHN are important risk factors of poor prognosis. PHN patients complicated with DM have severer clinical symp⁃ toms such pain，depression，anxiety，and sleep，which increases the consumption of analgesics.

Key words:

diabetes mellitus, postherpetic neuralgia, risk factors, prognosis