BACKGROUND: Patient activation comprises the knowledge, skills, and confidence for self-care and may lead to better health outcomes.

OBJECTIVES: We examined the relationship between patient activation and changes in health-related quality of life (HRQOL) after hospitalization for an acute coronary syndrome (ACS).

METHODS: We studied patients from 6 medical centers in central Massachusetts and Georgia who had been hospitalized for an ACS between 2011 and 2013. At 1 month after hospital discharge, the patients completed the 6-item Patient Activation Measure and were categorized into 4 levels of activation. Multinomial logistic regression analyses compared activation level with clinically meaningful changes ( > /=3.0 points, generic; > /=10.0 points, disease-specific) in generic physical (SF-36v2 Physical Component Summary [PCS]), generic mental (SF-36v2 Mental Component Summary [MCS]), and disease-specific (Seattle Angina Questionnaire [SAQ]) HRQOL from 1 to 3 and 1 to 6 months after hospitalization, adjusting for potential sociodemographic and clinical confounders.

RESULTS: The patients (N = 1042) were, on average, 62 years old, 34% female, and 87% non-Hispanic white. A total of 10% were in the lowest level of activation. The patients with the lowest activation had 1.95 times (95% confidence interval, 1.05-3.62) and 2.18 times (95% confidence interval, 1.17-4.05) the odds of experiencing clinically significant declines in MCS and SAQ HRQOL, respectively, between 1 and 6 months than the most activated patients. The patient activation level was not associated with meaningful changes in PCS scores.

CONCLUSIONS: Hospital survivors of an ACS with lower activation may be more likely to experience declines in mental and disease-specific HRQOL than more-activated patients, identifying a group at risk of poor outcomes.