ABSTRACT
Background
Understanding post-stroke family resilience would be helpful for healthcare professionals in planning interventions to facilitate family adaptation following stroke onset.
Objective
To investigate the level of family resilience and its predictors among patients with the first stroke.
Design
An explorative cross-sectional study.
Methods
The study was conducted on 288 first stroke patients recruited from 7 tertiary hospitals in China between July 2020 and October 2020, and they were followed up one month after stroke. Data were collected using the Medical Coping Modes Questionnaire, Self-efficacy for Managing Chronic Disease 6-item Scale, shortened Chinese version of Family Resilience Assessment Scale, and the Social Support Rating Scale. The predictive variables of family resilience were investigated using hierarchical regression analyses.
Results
A total of 255 patients finished the survey with a response rate of 88.5%. The mean score of family resilience was 96.19 (SD = 9.87), highest in the dimension of maintaining a positive outlook and lowest in utilizing social resources. Patient subjective support (β = 0.22, P = 0.004), social support utilization (β = 0.13, P = 0.027), self-efficacy for managing disease (β = 0.27, P < 0.001), marriage status (divorced vs married)(β=-0.18, P = 0.002), and caregivers’ relationship with patients (siblings vs spouse)(β=-0.18, P = 0.002) were predictors of family resilience.
Conclusion
Family resilience was low among stroke patients one month after the onset. Special attention should be paid to families of patients who were divorced, cared for by siblings, or have low social support or self-efficacy in managing stroke. Further research on family-based interventions may focus on increasing patient social support and promoting their self-efficacy in managing stroke.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully thank the participants enrolled in this study and the staff of the participating hospitals for their cooperation.
Disclosure statement
No conflict of interest has been declared by the authors.
Authors’ contributions
All the authors have made substantive contributions to the article.
Data availability statement
The datasets used during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request. https://pan.baidu.com/s/1FUbvRtIgNgF1ZEJJjXZPwg