OBJECTIVES: Short bowel syndrome (SBS) is a rare, complex clinical condition that results from loss of intestinal absorptive capacity. Parenteral nutrition (PN) is often needed to maintain clinical status in patients with SBS. Teduglutide reduces, and in some cases eliminates, patients’ dependency on PN. PN is not exclusively used in patients with SBS and, since robust utility data is often difficult to collect for rare conditions due to limited patient numbers, a wider body of published literature reporting a link between PN and health-related quality of life (HRQL) was considered. We assessed if an acceptable body of evidence was available to determine the HRQL impact associated with the use of PN that could support an assessment of the potential impact of reduced PN using teduglutide. METHODS: Searches were performed using MEDLINE, MEDLINE In-Process and Cochrane Library. Additionally, hand searches were performed at targeted conferences. Of 2,724 studies screened, 76 met the inclusion criteria: adults receiving PN for longer than 6 months and reported utilities or other HRQL data. RESULTS: Patients receiving PN were shown to have lower HRQL than the general population. HRQL was shown to increase at initiation of PN, compared to the pre-PN state. However, discontinuation of PN and intestinal transplantation (ITx) were associated with further improvements in HRQL. Trends associating increased number of PN complications, PN volume and PN frequency with lower HRQL were also identified. CONCLUSIONS: Improvements in HRQL achieved by discontinuing PN and ITx suggest that weaning patients with SBS off PN could increase HRQL. These, along with results of an ongoing vignette study in patients with SBS, may allow quantification of the HRQL associated with the use of teduglutide in SBS.