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Self‐care in adults with asthma: how they cope
Author(s) -
MÄkinen Satu,
Suominen Tarja,
Lauri Sirkka
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
journal of clinical nursing
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.94
H-Index - 102
eISSN - 1365-2702
pISSN - 0962-1067
DOI - 10.1046/j.1365-2702.2000.00429.x
Subject(s) - asthma , medicine , competence (human resources) , perspective (graphical) , self care , psychology , family medicine , clinical psychology , psychiatry , health care , social psychology , economic growth , artificial intelligence , computer science , economics
• The purpose of this study was to find out how well adult asthma patients in Finland cope with self‐care in three areas of asthma treatment. The areas of physical, psychological and social asthma treatment were examined. Associations between demographic background data and self‐care were also studied. • Data ( n = 130) for the study were collected using a questionnaire specially developed for this study. A deductive perspective was employed in data analysis. • Respondents showed fairly good competence in self‐care in all three areas of asthma treatment. However, up to 30% of the asthma patients had pets and 16% were smokers. • Extra stress was reduced by exercise and positive thinking. Humour was also important in helping most of the respondents cope mentally. • Social support played a significant part in fighting the sense of powerlessness which is caused by asthma. • According to the results, women coped better than men in the social area of self‐care.