Effectiveness of Mindfulness and Positive Strengthening mHealth Interventions for the Promotion of Subjective Emotional Wellbeing and Management of Self-Efficacy for Chronic Cardiac Diseases

Abstract

Intervention in health prevention and treatment via mobile phones is becoming a key element on health promotion. Testing the efficacy of these mobile health (mHealth) psychological interventions for cardiovascular health is necessary as it is a chronic pathology, and it can influence the affective and cognitive states of patients. This research aimed to analyze the effectiveness of two brief psychological interventions—mindfulness and positive strengthening—to promote subjective emotional wellbeing and disease management self-efficacy using mHealth. This was a three-arm intervention and feasibility study, with a pre-post design and three follow-up measures with 105 patients (93 completed all phases) with cardiovascular diseases. Group 1 and 2 received the mindfulness or strengthening intervention, and Group 3 was the control group. The positive–negative affect and management self-efficacy for chronic and cardiovascular diseases were analyzed over time, while anxiety and depression levels were assessed at the beginning of the study. The results showed that mindfulness and positive strengthening interventions both had a positive effect on participants’ affective state and management self-efficacy for the disease in comparison with the control group over time, even after controlling for baseline anxiety and depression levels. Positive strengthening seems to be more effective for improving cardiac self-efficacy, while mindfulness practice was significantly more effective at reducing negative affect at the first face-to-face evaluation.

Improving mental health and self-efficacy in older people through a mindfulness-based community intervention

“…In addition to self-esteem, self-e cacy is another key element of positive psychology that encourages a person to perform a particular task or behaviour successfully [42]. In this context, a previously published randomised clinical trial by Morone et al (2009) reported that a mindfulness intervention increased self-e cacy in the management of chronic low back pain in older people and in the selfmanagement of cardiovascular disease [45][46][47]. In addition, a study by Tsai et al (2023) showed that a mindfulness-based physical activity intervention in older people led to an increase in self-e cacy in preventing falls and a reduction in fear of falling, which had a positive impact on physical and physiological health [48].…”