The Relationship Between Self-Care Behavior and Concerns About Body Image in Patients Undergoing Hemodialysis in Iran

Background and aim: Hemodialysis treatment saves the life of people with end-stage renal disease (ERDS), but does not prevent the suffering of the disease, anxiety, hopelessness, and so on. Many studies have been performed on self-care behaviors as well as body image in different patients, but so far, no research has been done to investigate the relationship between self-care behavior and body image concerns in hemodialysis patients. Therefore, the aims of this study are to determine the relationship between self-care behavior and body image concern in patients undergoing hemodialysis.

Materials and methods: A cross-sectional design was used to evaluate Self-care Behavior and Concerns about Body Image in a convenience sample of 280 patients with ERDS. Measures included demographic factors, health characteristics, and validated instruments of the study constructs Body Image Concern Questionnaire (BICI) and Assessment of self-care behaviors with arteriovenous fistula (ASBHD-AVF).

Results: This study showed that self-care behaviors have the ability to predict body image concerns. There was a negative and significant relationship between self-care behavior and body image concern (B = -0.162, β = -0.140, p = 0.020). These variables explain 7.5% of predictors.

Conclusion: Although the findings of the present study showed that increasing age and improving the level of self-care behaviors in patients undergoing hemodialysis reduces body image anxiety, but women were the strongest predictor of body image anxiety.