Aim: The purpose of this study was to describe family support, self-efficacy perception and self-care behaviour among patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and to ascertain the relationship between these variables.
Background: It is important to work at improving confidence in the patients' ability to follow a self-care regimen by increasing self-efficacy. Family support also plays an important role in self-care activities.
Method and design: The study design is descriptive and correlational. Of 230 patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease who were recruited for the study, 200 agreed to participate. The patients were recruited by the first author from an outpatient clinic in the Department of Chest Disease of a university hospital and a pulmonary hospital in Erzurum, eastern Turkey. Data were collected by using a demographic data form, the Perceived Social Support from Family Scale, the Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Self-efficacy Scale and the Alberto Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Self-care Behaviour Inventory.
Results: Although most participants (91.5%) perceived that they had family support and more than three quarters (73.0%) of the participants engaged in an adequate amount of self-care behaviours, only twenty five participants' (12.5%) perceived self-efficacy as high. There were statistically significant positive relationships between family support and self-care behaviour (r=0.302; p=0.01) and between self-efficacy and self-care behaviour (r=0.186; p=0.01). There was also a statistically significant positive relationship between family support and self-efficacy (r=0.412; p=0.01).
Conclusion: The results of the study demonstrated weak to moderate, but statistically significant, relationships between family support and self-care behaviours, self-efficacy and self-care behaviour and family support and self-efficacy in Turkish patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.
Relevance to clinical practice: The assessment of the family support, self-efficacy and self-care behaviours of the patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease should be an essential part of nursing practice. The study also provides the foundation for the conduct of future studies of self-care training for managing patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.