Paper
Saturday, July 24, 2004
Demands of Illness, Medication Regimen Complexity, Mastery of Stress, Social Support, and Well-being in People with Parkinson's Disease and Their Caregivers
Carolyn Lindgren, RN, PhD, School of Nursing, School of Nursing, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA
| Learning Objective #1: Explain the conceptual relationships and measurement of social support, demands of illness, medication complexity, mastery of stress, and well-being of PD individuals and their caregivers |
| Learning Objective #2: Explain the statistically supported relationships among demands of illness, medication complexity, mastery of stress, social support, and well-being in PD individuals and their caregivers and discuss the meaning and implications of such relationships
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Persons with Parkinsons Disease (PD) and their family caregivers, often a spouse, cope with the illness over a number of years. Their well being is a part of their illness demands including complex medication regimens, stress mastery and sense of help from others. Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine relationships among demands of illness, medication regimen complexity, social support, stress mastery, and the wellbeing of persons afflicted with Parkinsons disease and their caregivers. Design: Ex post facto descriptive design was used to examine relationships among these variables in the PD individuals and their caregivers. Comparison between the two participant groups was done to detect similarities and differences in their coping experiences. Subjects: The subjects were 32 dyads of persons afflicted with Parkinsons disease and their caregivers. Instruments: Demands of illness were measured on the Demands of Illness Inventory (Woods, Haberman, & Packard, 1987,1993); Medication regimen on the Medication Regimen Complexity Index(MCI) (Kelley & Taylor, 1988); Social support on the The PRQ-85 (Weinert, 1985); Mastery of stress on the Mastery of Stress Instrument (MSI) (Younger, 1993); and well-being on the The SF-36 Health Survey (Medical Outcomes Trust, 1992). Findings: For the PD individuals demands were related to medication complexity (r.=38, p<.05) and reduced mastery of stress, (r=-.46,p<.05). Caregivers’ demands were related to medication complexity, special instruction medications of the PD individual, (r=.37, p<.05). The PD individuals and caregivers significantly differed in their levels of social support, well being levels, and degree of stress mastery. The PD individual’s social support was significantly related to demands of illness. Conclusions: Findings indicated that medication complexity is linked to the demands the illness imposes on individuals with PD and their caregivers. The differences in mastery of stress and social support implies different nursing needs for the PD individual and the caregivers.
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Sigma Theta Tau International
July 22-24, 2004