The role of personal characteristics in the relationship between health and psychological distress among kidney transplant recipients

• Published in: Social science & medicine (1982) 2012-10, Vol.75 (8), p.1547-1554
• Main Authors: Schulz, Torben, Niesing, Jan, Stewart, Roy E., Westerhuis, Ralf, Hagedoorn, Mariet, Ploeg, Rutger J., Homan van der Heide, Jaap J., Ranchor, Adelita V.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adaptation, Psychological; Adult; Adult and adolescent clinical studies; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Biological and medical sciences; Comorbidity; Coping; Cross-Sectional Studies; Distress; Emotional disorders; Female; Health; Health Problems; Health Status; Humans; Kidney transplantation; Kidney Transplantation - psychology; Kidneys; Male; Mastery; Medical sciences; Middle Aged; Miscellaneous; Models, Psychological; Netherlands; Optimism; Organ Transplantation; Perceived health status; Personality disorders; Psychological Distress; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychopathology. Psychiatry; Public health. Hygiene; Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine; Quality of Life; Self-esteem; Stress; Stress, Psychological - etiology; Surgery (general aspects). Transplantations, organ and tissue grafts. Graft diseases; Surgery of the urinary system; The Netherlands; Transplants & implants; Young Adult
• ISSN: 0277-9536; 1873-5347
• DOI: 10.1016/j.socscimed.2012.05.028

Although kidney transplantation improves overall quality of life and physical functioning, improvements of psychological distress are often modest. However, apparent stressors such as comorbidity are only weakly associated with psychological distress and their impact differs considerably between patients. Wilson and Cleary proposed a theoretical model to explain these relationships. This model has been supported by research, but has never been applied in a population of kidney transplant recipients. Findings of the current study are based on a cross-sectional study carried out in 2008 in the northern Netherlands. An elaborated version of Wilson and Cleary’s model specifying hypothesized relationships of objective health, functional status, subjective health, personal characteristics and psychological distress was evaluated with structural equation modelling. After elimination of non-significant paths the final model provided a good fit for the data, X2 (2)=4.23, p=0.12; RMSEA=0.047, CIRMSEA (0; 0.11); ECVI=0.060, ECVIsat=0.059. Results suggest that objective health has an indirect effect on psychological distress, in size comparable to the effects exerted by functional status and subjective health. Personal characteristics are the strongest determinant of psychological distress, but are directly and indirectly affected by objective health. Results indicate that poor health might cause psychological distress by increasing coping demands while simultaneously decreasing coping resources. ► A comprehensive model of the interrelation of health and distress was tested and provided good fit for the data. ► Health has indirect effects on distress, mediated by functional status, subjective health and personal characteristics. ► Findings suggest that poor health leads to double strain by increasing disease burden and decreasing coping resources