PhD defence: Partners of patients with acquired brain injury impact, dyadic relationships and support
Summary
Partners of patients with acquired brain injury often experience high levels of burden, anxiety and depressive symptoms. Vincent Cox investigated this in detail during his PhD trajectory. These symptoms in partners turn out not to decrease during the two years after brain injury and besides the characteristics of the patient, especially the characteristics of the partner themselves play a role in the development of these symptoms.
His research also shows that psychological skills of patients and partners influence the symptoms of the other person in the couple. For example, if the patient has a better coping, the partner will experience less symptoms of anxiety. It is important to take this interdependent effect into account when caregivers provide support for patients and their partners.
The CARE4Carer intervention has been developed to support partners. CARE4Carer consists of an online support program and face-to-face consultations with a social worker. The development of this intervention is described in this thesis. The expectation is that participation in CARE4Carer improves feelings of mastery in partners. These can be determined with the Caregiver Mastery Scale. Vincent has investigated this instrument and concluded that it can be used to measure feelings of caregiver mastery in partners of patients with acquired brain injury.
- Start date and time
- End date and time
- Location
- PhD candidate
- drs. V.C.M. Cox
- Dissertation
- Partners of patients with acquired brain injury impact, dyadic relationships and support
- PhD supervisor(s)
- prof. dr. J.M.A. Visser-Meilij
- prof. dr. C. van Heugten
- Co-supervisor(s)
- dr. V.P.M. Schepers