ABSTRACT
Many studies have demonstrated psychosocial problem of people with epilepsy that who has depressionand anxiety symptoms, ashamed, worried, guilt or feelings of worthlessness, poor self-esteem and socialside which includes education, employment issues, marriage, pregnancy, quality of life and stigma. Theseare related to the knowledge of the social, duration of epilepsy and seizure types.People with epilepsy are coexisting that seizure relatedissues such as behavioral and psychosocialproblems and comorbid psychiatric disorders that are prone to develop in patients with this disorder.Therefore hidden psychosocial problems stigmatizing and negative attitude are arisen from the social.The reason of that is demanded improve the quality of life for people with epilepsy and also is requiredto solve problem, completely. Not only medicine is treatment of people with epilepsy, but coping withepilepsy may also associate with psychosocial problemsfacing patients with epilepsy.According to this, hospital and social positive factors need to initiate for the people with epilepsywithout seizure and help to live normally. Furthermore, it is necessary to establish national program andrecommendation.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Epilepsy is a common neurological disease, which need to health care and public health servicetopicality that is a very important for people with epilepsy (PWE). Therefore psychosocial problemssuch as depression, anxiety, and stigma, discrimination from other people, negative public attitude andmisunderstanding significantly influence on their psychosocial well-being and quality of life. PURPOSE: To study an anxiety and depression in people with epilepsy.MATERIALS AND METHODS: 77 patients aged between 20 and 60 were included in our study group. In order to identify psychosocial problems we used the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and a tenitem measure of felt stigma (Austin, Dunn et al) for this cross-sectional study.RESULT: There were 77 PWE and slightly more 53.2% male, 46.8% female and, in comparison group. Of theseparticipants 44.2%were married, 75.3% unemployment. The frequencies of anxiety symptoms in PWEwere 31.2% very anxiety, 32.5%anxiety and 36.4% not anxiety, the rates of depressive symptoms inPWE were18.2% very depressed, 19.5% depressed and 62.3% not depressed, respectively. All ofthe 62.3% PWE felt stigma. Considering the age, psychological problem, some of the variables ofthe participants, the age of the people with epilepsy was associated with depression and the stigmascores, negatively (r = -0.2, p = 0.05; r = -0.2, p = 0.05).We observed a positive correlation between BDI and BAI scores in PWE (r = 0.6; p = 0.01).There hasalso the relationship between stigma and anxiety, depression, social-interaction of the attitude scoresin PWE (r = 0.5, p = 0.01; r = 0.5, p = 0.01; r = 0.4, p = 0.01), whereas that the correlation statistic didnot indicate a relationship between the duration of the epilepsy and anxiety, depression, stigma andsocial-interaction’s scoresCONCLUSION: Of the people with epilepsy 31.2% have very anxiety, 33.8% have anxiety and 18.2% have verydepressed, 19.5% have depressed. This reveals that it has positive relationship with social-interactionand attitude. Frequency of epileptic seizures influences the anxiety and depression of the people withepilepsy and thus worsens their stigmatization.