Oral sildenafil therapy improves health-related quality of life and functional status in pulmonary arterial hypertension

Sildenafil, a selective inhibitor of cyclic guanosine monophosphate (cGMP) specific phosphodiesterase-5 inhibitor, has shown promising results as a novel oral monotherapy in the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). We conducted a cross-sectional survey of 19 consecutive PAH patients, aged 16–75 years, with WHO functional class II or worse over 3 months of oral sildenafil. Improvement in exercise capacity was achieved in 15/19 (79%) patients. 6-minute walk test distance increased from 299 ± 118 m to 360 ± 127 m, p = 0.016, and WHO functional class decreased significantly. Both PASP and CI showed a non-significant trend toward improvement. Patients also reported significant improvement in physical (p = 0.002) and social (p < 0.001) functioning, and general health (p = 0.01) of Rand SF-36 questionnaire. There was improvement in domains of role limitation due to physical health (p = 0.16), emotion (p = 0.14), and energy level (p = 0.4). Our study suggests that oral sildenafil monotherapy is effective in improving exercise capacity and health-related quality of life amongst PAH patients.