RESEARCH ARTICLE
Beliefs About Health, Health Risks and Health Expectations from the Perspective of People with a Psychotic Disorder
Sally Hultsjö*, 1, Susanne Syren2
Article Information
Identifiers and Pagination:
Year: 2013Volume: 7
First Page: 114
Last Page: 122
Publisher ID: TONURSJ-7-114
DOI: 10.2174/1874434601307010114
Article History:
Received Date: 24/1/2013Revision Received Date: 11/6/2013
Acceptance Date: 29/6/2013
Electronic publication date: 20/8/2013
Collection year: 2013
open-access license: This is an open access article licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted, non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the work is properly cited.
Abstract
Aim:
To examine beliefs about health, health risks and health expectations from the perspective of people diagnosed with a psychotic disorder
Background:
People with psychotic disorders have a threefold higher risk of developing physical health problems than the general population, and prevention of these problems is warranted. Examining patients´ health beliefs could help deepen our understanding of how to plan successful health interventions with this group.
Methods:
Qualitative semi-structured interviews were conducted from November 2010 to October 2011 with 17 people with psychotic disorders. Data were analyzed using a qualitative content analysis.
Results:
An overall positive picture of health was found despite the fact that physical health was found to be hard to verbalize and understand. Health was mainly associated with psychological wellbeing, while health risks were found to be related to uncertain bodily identity, troublesome thoughts and inner voices, and exclusion from society. Interest in learning, and visions and goals of health seemed to increase awareness of health risks and health expectations, while not worrying could be viewed as a hindrance for health expectations.
Conclusion:
There is a lack of expressed awareness of physical health risks, but such awareness is fundamental to performing life-style changes [14]. Nurses thus have an important task to help patients understand and verbalize potential physical health risks, and to find out what motivates them to adopt health behaviors.
