The Association Between History Of Disease And Psychometric Characteristics Among The Chronic Disease Patients

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The chronic disease patients have various psychological problems during the treatment. Therefore, it is needed about understanding and support for chronic disease patients. The main purposes of this study are to identify the psychometric characteristics. METHODS: To evaluate the psychometric characteristics of chronic disease patients-liver cirrhosis, chronic pulmonary disease, etc. -a questionnaire(SCL-90-R) survey was performed toward 100 chronic disease patients in admission to 2 general hospital. 100 persons without any disease were investigated by the same questionnaire for comparison. The survey was performed from June to August 1996. RESULTS: The disease history among the patients, 31% of patients suffered from liver disease, 19% of patients suffered from chronic respiratory disease. 30% of patients reported that they were not expected a recovery from the disease. The patients have a significant higher score in the somatization, obsessive-compulsive, interpersonal sensitivity, depression, anxiety, hostility, phobic anxiety, paranoid ideation, psychoticism than normal control (p<0.05). Most of the psychometric characteristics were associated with expectancy of the recovery, education about the disease, number of admission, duration of admission and type of disease(p<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: The chronic disease patients showed higher score psychological symptoms in various characteristics than normal control. Therefore it will be needed that is an proper treatment and psychological support continuously.