Abstract
To analyse how patients with chronic diseases would interpret their illness, and how these interpretations were related to spirituality/religiosity, life satisfaction, and escape from illness, we performed a cross-sectional survey among patients with chronic diseases from Poland (n = 275) using standardized questionnaires. Illness was interpreted mostly as an Adverse Interruption of life (61%), Threat/Enemy (50%), Challenge (42%), and rarely as a Punishment (8%). Regression analyses revealed that escape from illness was the best predictor of negative disease perceptions and also strategy associated disease perceptions, and a negative predictor of illness as something of Value, while Value was predicted best by specific spiritual issues. Patients’ religious Trust and partner status were among the significant contributors to their life satisfaction. Data show that specific dimensions of spirituality are important predictors for patients’ interpretation of illness. Particularly the fatalistic negative perceptions could be indicators that patients may require further psychological assistance to cope with their burden.
Highlights
Based on the assumptions of Leventhal’s Self-Regulation Theory [1], the individual being is an active problem solver that consciously activates efforts to modulate his thoughts, emotions and behaviours— when facing illness or health affections
With respect to the findings described above, it is clear that a person’s spirituality/religiosity may have an influence on how her/she may see illness [13,21], and this may have an influence on life satisfaction, too
The data show that specific dimensions of spirituality are important predictor for patients’ distinct interpretation of illness
Summary
Based on the assumptions of Leventhal’s Self-Regulation Theory [1], the individual being is an active problem solver that consciously activates efforts to modulate his thoughts, emotions and behaviours— when facing illness or health affections. An important aspect for dealing with illness in terms of coping and illness interpretation are individual representations of disease. Relying on Diefenbach and Leventhal [2,3], there are two main types of representations, i.e., cognitive and emotional processes. With respect to the “Transactional Model of Stress and Coping” of Park and Folkman [4], the ability to cope with stress (including illness) requires that people can find meaning in it and recognize it as important. Taylor [5] argued that patients with breast cancer adapted psychologically when they were able to find positive meanings in their illness.
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