BackgroundDepression necessitating assistance from health professionals has a lifetime prevalence of 10%. Chronic disease increases comorbidity with mood and/or anxiety disorders. Patients with chronic pulmonary disease present with severely impaired functionality, chronic somatic and psychogenic pain, require frequent hospitalizations and have a dependency upon medical and nursing personnel. In the present study we assessed anxiety and depression in patients hospitalized for pulmonary disease in a pulmonary disease hospital.MethodsWe assessed anxiety, using the Spielberger state-trait anxiety scale, and depression, using the Beck Depression Inventory, in 132 patients with pulmonary disease.ResultsA total of 49.2% of the sample had moderate or severe depression and 26.5% had anxiety. Women had higher depression and anxiety scores than men (t test, p < 0.05). Depression was positively correlated with anxiety, age and time from diagnosis. Anxiety was positively correlated with depression and time from diagnosis (Pearson r = 0.62 and 0.29, p < 0.01). Patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and bronchial asthma had higher depression scores than patients with tuberculosis (t test, p < 0.01).ConclusionDepression and anxiety are very prevalent in patients with pulmonary disease, especially chronic disease. This may be a very important negative factor in patients' adaptation to the chronic course of their disease.

BackgroundChronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a major health problem, especially in adults over 40 years of age, and has a great social and economic impact. The psychological morbidity of COPD patients with regard to anxiety and depressive symptoms has been extensively studied in the past. However, few studies have investigated the prevalence of alexithymia in these patients, as well as its association with this comorbidity. Based on this fact, we studied the prevalence of alexithymia and its association with anxiety and depressive symptoms in COPD outpatients.MethodsThe present study included 167, randomly selected, outpatients diagnosed with COPD. Alexithymia, anxiety and depression were assessed using the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20), Spielberger Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), respectively.ResultsThe mean BDI score was 12.88 (SD: 7.7), mean STAI score 41.8 (SD: 11.0) and mean TAS-20 score 48.2 (SD: 11.5). No differences were observed between genders regarding age and alexithymia (t test P > 0.05), while female patients presented higher depression and trait anxiety scores than males (t test P < 0.05). Clinically significant levels of anxiety were present in 37.1% of men, and in 45.7% of women. The mean depression score was also higher than the corresponding mean score in the general population (one-sample t test P < 0.01), while 27.7% and 30.5% of the sample presented mild and moderate to severe depression, respectively. Finally, a strong correlation was observed between alexithymia, depression and anxiety.ConclusionsThis study confirms the high prevalence of anxiety and depression symptoms in Greek outpatients with COPD. The prevalence of alexithymia in COPD patients, contrary to what has been observed in patients with other chronic respiratory diseases, seem to be lower. However, we observed a strong association between alexithymia, depression and anxiety levels. This observation suggests that alexithymia should be taken into consideration when drafting specific psychotherapeutic interventions for these patients.

BackgroundThe Julkunen Family Support Scale aims to record the sense of support that a subject receives from the members of his family. The object of the present study was to investigate the reliability and to assess the validity of the Greek translation of the Julkunen Family Support Scale in Greek health care professionals in a public general hospital.MethodsIn order to determine the indicator of validity of content we addressed nine expert professionals and one sociologist, asking them to evaluate how much relevant to the sense of familial support are the items of the questionnaire. Additionally, to assess reliability we used a sample of health care professionals.ResultsThere was agreement among experts for the validity of content. Cronbach's alpha for the total items was 0.820, pointing to high validity. Only replacing item four could increase the scale's validity, but without significant differences.ConclusionsThe scale, in its Greek version, appears to be a brief and reliable tool that can be used for inpatients, in clinics as well as in epidemiologic studies of received family support.

BackgroundSeveral studies have reported high prevalence of anxiety and depression in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) outpatients. Moreover, these patients share psychological or psychopathological characteristics that inhibit their ability to cope with the disease. In the present study we aimed to record the prevalence of psychological symptom patterns in a sample of Greek COPD outpatients and to assess which psychological factors (and to which degree) contribute to vital exhaustion (VE).MethodsThe study included 139 COPD outpatients. We used the Symptom Checklist 90 - Revised (SCL-90-R) and the Maastricht Questionnaire (MQ) in order to evaluate psychological symptom patterns and VE, respectively.ResultsThe mean MQ score was 19.6, which is significantly higher than the corresponding score in the general population. Regarding the SCL-90-R dimensions, depression was the highest followed by somatization, obsessive-compulsive and anxiety dimensions. Additionally, a positive correlation was observed between the MQ and the SCL-90-R dimensions. MQ failed to demonstrate correlation with age, gender, education level or the severity of the disease. Depression seems to be responsible for 57.9% of the variation of VE, while obsessive-compulsiveness is responsible for an additional 2.4%. All the remaining dimensions of SCL-90-R had no statistically significant contributions.ConclusionsOur findings suggest the high prevalence of VE, together with high rates in most of the SCL-90-R dimensions with greater depression, somatization, obsessive-compulsiveness and anxiety in a Greek COPD group at various Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (GOLD) diagnostic criteria stages. The coexistence of such symptoms should be further assessed as an eventual unfavorable prognostic factor.

To assess correlations for perceived family support with burnout in Greek nurses, the Julkunen Family Support Questionnaire and the Maslach Burnout Inventory were administered to nurses (22 men and 88 women; M age = 35.6 yr., SD = 5.7 yr.; M work experience = 12.2 yr., SD = 6.2 yr.). The correlation was positive but low for family support and sense of personal accomplishment by women; all the other correlations were low, accounting for very small variance.