Religiousness and Symptoms of Depression in Native and Immigrant Chronic Dialysis Patients in the Netherlands.

Abstract

For immigrant chronic dialysis patients, religious behavior and religious coping may have a different impact on depressive symptoms compared to native patients. This study aims to describe both cross-sectional and longitudinal associations between religious behavior and coping with symptoms of depression for 281 native and 277 immigrant dialysis patients in the Netherlands. A higher prevalence of depressive symptoms was found in immigrant compared to native patients (49% vs. 36%). No significant cross-sectional or longitudinal associations were found in both groups between religious behavior and positive religious coping with depressive symptoms. Strong significant cross-sectional associations were found between negative religious coping items and depressive symptoms in both groups, while no longitudinal associations were found. So, similar impact of religiousness on the presence of depressive symptoms was found for both native and immigrant dialysis patients. Therefore, these results do not explain the higher prevalence of depressive symptoms found in immigrant chronic dialysis patients compared to native patients.