The effect of group social work intervention based on emotion-focused therapy on family functioning of women caring for individuals with psychotic disorder

In this study, the effect of group social work intervention based on emotion-focused therapy approach on the burden of care and family functioning of women caring for family members with psychotic disorders was examined. In this context, the necessary ethical permissions were obtained and the study was conducted with volunteer women who receive services from the Community Mental Health Center in Sakarya province and care for family members diagnosed with psychotic disorder. The research was conducted as a mixed method research and an explanatory sequential design was utilized. In this context, a quasi-experimental study based on the "pretest-posttest with control group" model was conducted during the collection of quantitative data. The qualitative data of the study were obtained from the preliminary interviews with the participants and the transcripts of the group work. In this context, 30 women were included in the study, 15 in the intervention group and 15 in the comparison group. Before the intervention, the Perceived Family Burden Scale and Family Assessment Scale were applied to the caregivers and their data were collected through the data collection form prepared within the scope of the research. A group social work intervention structured according to emotion-focused therapy was applied to the intervention group for six weeks. Nine participants completed the intervention. For this reason, a paired sample design was used in the data analysis phase, and the pre-test and post-test scores of 18 women, nine from the intervention group and nine from the comparison group, were compared. Mann-Whitney U-Test and Wilcoxon Signed Ranks Test were used to analyze the quantitative data. As a result of the study, when the post-test scores of the participants were taken into consideration, there was a decrease in the burden of care in the intervention group (p < .05), while there was no change in the comparison group. There was no significant difference between the groups in terms of family functionality scores (p > .05). Considering the qualitative data, it was determined that the intervention group experienced less care burden and that conflicts and communication problems within the family decreased. In this context, it is recommended that group interventions based on emotion-focused therapy should be expanded, structured to include other family members, and the number of interventions for families should be increased for future research.