Comparison between Styles of Coping with Stress in Patient withMultiple Sclerosis and Healthy people in the East of Mazandaran

Background and Multiple Sclerosis is a disease related to immune system with unknown factors which is considered one of the most important debilitating neurological diseases in adults particularly in youths in which myelin part of Central Nervous System (CNS) is damaged. This study mainly aims to compare styles of coping with stress in people with Multiple Sclerosisand healthy people in the East of Mazandaran. in this study performed in case-control method comprised of the age range of 20-40 years، 191 patients with MS and 191 healthy people out of patient''s accompaniers from the east of Mazandaran based on age، gender، marital status and education level matched with each other were selected. Endler and Parker''s questionnaires of demographic characteristics and styles of coping with stress were used as a tool. Data were analyzed using independent t-test. The mean of problem-focused coping style in patients was 16. 86 and the one in healthy people was 15. 60 (P>0. 05). The mean of emotion-focused coping style in patients was 32. 39 and the one in healthy people was 33. 15 (P>0. 05)، and finally the mean of avoidant coping style in patients was 54. 05 and the one in healthy people was 32. 63 (P<0. 01). Results of the study indicated that there was no significant difference between patients with MS in using problem-focused coping styles and emotion-focused compared with healthy people and they use more avoidant coping style.