Adjustment to coronary heart disease: associations with gender-related traits

Abstract

Previous studies suggest that gender-related traits have an impact on the adjustment to chronic illnesses. Agency (A) and communion (C) predict better health outcomes, while unmitigated agency (UA) and unmitigated communion (UC) are associated with physical and mental adjustment difficulties. The aim of the study is to evaluate the role of gender-related traits on adjustment to coronary heart disease. Evaluating the baseline (T0) data of our longitudinal study 113 acut coronary syndrome patients’ resposes are examined (73% male; age: 60,28±10,7 years). EPAQ, RUCS, BFI, COPE-Brief, social support, RSES, BSCI-LM, ZTPI were used for assessment. High UA is related to neuriticism positively, while A is negatively. A is a negative predictor of depression, while UA is related negatively to social support. As regards of coping styles UA correlates negatively to positive reframing and use of emotional support while UC is positively. The strongest positive correlation is between A and self-esteem, while UA is related to self-esteem and meaning of life negatively. All traits, except for UA are positively related to future time perspective, which enhances adjustment mostly. We are collecting longitudinal datas, 2 months (T1) and 6 months (T2) after acut coronary event and recruiting new patients. Our preliminary results show that unmitigated agency patients report worse adjustment than agency which is associated with better mental health. Surprisingly communion and unmitigated communion does not show strongly different correlations. Understanding the effects of these traits on the adjustment allows us to create specially tailored psychosocial intervention programmes during the rehabilitation.