Psychological resilience, coping with stress and post traumatic growth in patients after bone marrow transplantation

The present study was carried out as a descriptive study for determining the level of psychological resilience, coping with stress and post-traumatic growth after Bone Marrow Transplantation (BMT) and the relationships between these variables. The study was carried out during the dates of November 1-30, 2016 with 120 patients followed up at the hematology polyclinic of a university hospital following bone marrow transplantation. Personal Information Form, Psychological Resilience Scale for Adults, (PRSA), Ways of Coping with Stress Scale (WCSS), Posttraumatic Growth Scale (PGS) were used for data acquisition. The data were evaluated via frequency, percentage, average and correlation analyses using IBM SPSS 22 software. It was determined as a result of the study that; the PRSA score average of BMT patients was 120.92±14.3, PGS item score average was 3.30±0.54, WCSS optimistic approach sub-scale score average was 14.53±1.1, self-confident approach sub-scale score average was 20.94±3. A positive relationship was determined between the PRSA total scores of the patients and the self-confident approach and optimistic approach sub-scales of WCSS, whereas a negative relationship was determined with desperate approach and submissive approach sub-scale scores (p<0.05). A positive and statistically significant relationship was determined between PRSA and PGS total score and sub-scale score averages (p<0.05). It was determined in the present study that posttraumatic growth increases positively with increasing psychological resilience, that posttraumatic growth and psychological resilience increase positively with the use of optimistic approach and self-confident approach for coping with stress. Nurses should evaluate the patients with regard to characteristics such as ways of coping with stress, posttraumatic growth and psychological resilience and should plan interventions for improvement in order to ensure that the patients come out strongly from this difficult treatment process with minimum harm. Keywords: Bone Marrow Transplantation, Psychological Resilience, Coping with Stress, Posttraumatic Growth, Nursing