The Effectiveness of Intervention based on Strengthening Family Coping Resources Approach on Resilience in Family Caregivers of Patients with Schizophrenia

Due to the importance of family caregivers in the home caring of patients with schizophrenia and the imposition of their care responsibility, it seems that in order to strengthen their mental health and improve taking care of patients with schizophrenia, measures should be taken to improve the resilience of family caregivers. The aim of the present research was to determine the effects of interventions based on the strengthening family coping resources approach on the resilience of family caregivers of patients with schizophrenia. This experimental study was carried out on 60 family caregivers of patients with schizophrenia admitted to Ibn-e-Sina Psychiatric Hospital of Mashhad, Iran in 2018 - 2019.  They were randomly divided into two groups of intervention (n=29) and control group (n=31). In the intervention group, according to the guideline of the strengthening family coping resources developed by Kaiser et al., interventions based on this approach were implemented during 15 sessions of 120-150 minutes twice a week, and the control group received routine care. Data were collected by the Connor and Davidson Resilience Scale (2003) in two stages before and after intervention. Data were analyzed by SPSS-22 software, independent t-test and paired t-test. Among the participants, 40 were female (66.3%) and 20 (33.3%) number of the patients were mothers. In the pre-intervention stage, there was no significant difference between the mean of total resiliency score in both intervention and control groups (p = 0.45). This is while there was a significant difference between the mean changes in the total resiliency score in the intervention and control groups (p<0.001). Interventions based on the strengthening family coping resources approach can be effective in enhancing resilience in family caregivers of patients with schizophrenia.