Effect of Marital Status on Depression and Mortality among Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease from National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey 2005-2014

Background: The relationship between marital status and CKD is rarely studied. We aimed to explore the effect of marital status on the depression and mortality of patients with CKD. Methods: The data sources came from the NHANES database during 2005-2014 and 3,865 participants were included in this study. We used logistic regression models to examine the relationship between marital status and depression of CKD patients. The Cox proportional hazard models were used to evaluate the association between marital status and mortality of CKD patients. Results: In terms of depression in CKD patients, unmarried patients had a worse situation than married patients. Meanwhile, after adjusting the covariables, unmarried patients had increased risk of depression (OR = 1.26, 95% CI: 1.01-1.57) compared with married CKD patients, especially in males (OR = 1.45, 95% CI: 1.02-2.06) and patients with more than college education level (OR = 12.4, 95% CI: 3.75-41.02). There was a significant relationship between marital status and mortality of general CKD patients (HR = 1.36, 95% CI: 1.17-1.58). Moreover, marriage showed a protective effect against death among male patients, patients with school graduate or less and more than college educational level, patients with high income, and patients in different estimated glomerular filtration rate groups. Conclusions: The use of large numbers of participants has revealed the effect of marital status on CKD patients. Unmarried ones had a higher risk of depression than married ones among CKD patients. Meanwhile, the risk of death was higher in unmarried ones than married ones among CKD patients in this study.