Effect of mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy on quality of life and self-efficacy in patients with Arthritis Rheumatoid

The patients with arthritis rheumatoid suffer from vulnerable quality of life and self-efficacy due to this chronic disease and being engaged in therapy processes. Therefore, the present study was conducted to investigate the effectiveness of mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy on quality of life and self-efficacy of the patients with arthritis rheumatoid.

The research method was quasi-experimental with pretest-posttest design. The statistical population included the patients with arthritis rheumatoid who referred to rheumatology centers in Isfahan in 2019. Through purposive sampling method, 30 patients were selected and randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. The experimental group received eight seventy-five-minutes sessions of mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy interventions. Data collection tools in the study were quality of life (Ware and Sherbourne, 1992) and self-efficacy (Schwarzer and Jerusalem, 1981) questionnaires. The data were analyzed by ANCOVA test using SPSS ver. 23 software.

The results showed that mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy has significant effect on quality of life and self-efficacy of the patients with arthritis rheumatoid (P-Value<0.001) and succeeded in increasing their quality of life and self-efficacy.

According to the findings of the present study it can be concluded that mindfulness-based stress reduction therapy can be used as an efficient intervention to improve quality of life and self-efficacy of the patients with arthritis rheumatoid through employing mindful attitude techniques and mindful activities, addressing problem-making feelings and emotions, and using breathing practices to manage anger.