Compliance with the Medical Regimen and Partner's Quality of Life after Heart Transplantation

The authors investigated 40 heart transplant recipients and their partners to determine both the partner's quality of life upon transplantation and the experiences of both patient and partner with compliance with the medical regimen. Data on sleep disturbances, social isolation, emotional react...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Quality of life research 1993-06, Vol.2 (3), p.205-212
Main Authors: Erdman, R A, Horstman, L, van Domburg, R T, Meeter, K, Balk, A H
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Anxiety
Anxiety - epidemiology
Caregivers - psychology
Depression - epidemiology
Depressive disorders
Diet
Female
Heart
Heart transplantation
Heart Transplantation - psychology
Humans
Male
Marriage - psychology
Medication adherence
Memory
Middle Aged
Patient Compliance
Quality of Life
Sleep Wake Disorders - epidemiology
Social Isolation
Social Support
Spouses
Surveys and Questionnaires
Transplantation
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Summary:The authors investigated 40 heart transplant recipients and their partners to determine both the partner's quality of life upon transplantation and the experiences of both patient and partner with compliance with the medical regimen. Data on sleep disturbances, social isolation, emotional reactions, depression, anxiety, partner's apprehension, social support and compliance (regarding behaviour and emotional experience) were obtained approximately 21 months after transplantation. Compared to related study groups, partners did not experience more problems in sleep, social isolation, emotional reactions, depression and anxiety. Patients overestimated the apprehension of their partners significantly (p < 0.0001). Generally speaking, with the exception of three items relating to eating fish, canned food and forgetfulness in medicine intake, patients and partners agreed with respect to actual compliance behaviour. Lowest compliance concerned regular physical exercise: 28%. Both patient and partner insisted that they had scarcely any emotional problem with the regimen. Further systematic research is needed to bring to light factors that affect compliance as well as adequate methods to bring about an improvement therein.
ISSN:0962-9343
1573-2649
DOI:10.1007/BF00435224