Chapter 2 - Coping with chronic illness: The challenge of patients with renal disease

Abstract

Coping with any chronic illness is demanding, but there are many unique features of coping with chronic kidney disease. This chapter reviews the interrelationship between medical and psychiatric factors that influence patient’s adjustment to CKD, dialysis, and transplantation. The role of predisposing risk factors as a vulnerability to the development of negative reactions to medical illness is highlighted. Additionally, there is a review of the value of conceptual models in understanding why a particular patient might respond or behave in certain ways when faced with the stress of a chronic illness. Finally a model highlighting the confluence of pain, mood, sexual difficulty, and sleep dysfunction in patients with CKD is presented.