出版社：International Medical Journal Management and Indexing System
摘要：Objectives: Heart transplantation improves survival and quality of life among recipients, but also may create considerable distress for family members who provide care and support, due to the substantial life changes that result. Little is known about quality of life and psychological adjustment among this population. The purpose of this study was to investigate the quality of life in physical and psychological functioning among family caregivers of heart transplant recipients in Memphis, TN, USA. Materials and Methods: A secondary analysis was used to address the purpose, utilizing a primary data set, which was collected for a cross-sectional study. The data included the quality of life among 59 family caregivers of heart transplant recipients (average time since transplant was 4.5 years; min: 3 months max:17 years). Results: The study revealed that depressive symptomatology was negatively correlated with perceived social support, and positively correlated with the number and severity of psychosocial stressors and the likelihood of caregiver hospitalization during the past year (p Conclusions: The depressive symptomatology in family caregivers of heart transplant recipients is similar to that observed in community samples, and is lower than has been observed for caregivers of patients with other chronic diseases. We concluded that depressive symptomatology was associated with several negative physical and psychological effects.
关键词：Depression; heart transplantation; caregivers; quality of life
