Death related depression and death anxiety among patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease

Death Related Depression and Death Anxiety Among Patients with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease The study was descriptively and cross-sectionally done in order to determine death related depression and death anxiety level among patients diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). The sample of the study was composed of 104 patients who were hospitalized due to COPD diagnosis at thoracic units. The data were collected using "Patient Information Form", "Thorson-Powell Death Anxiety Scale", "Death Related Depression Scale" and "Medical Research Council Scale". For the analyses of the data; numbers, percentages, means, Independent Sample T test, Kruskal Wallis Variance Analysis, Mann Whitney U test and Correlation Analysis were employed. Mean age of the participant patients was 67.65±9.63 years and 77.9% of them were male patients. The most disruptive symptoms due to COPD were dyspnea (71.2%), coughing (17.3%) and sputum expectoration (11.5%). It was identified that 44.2% of the patients had mild level of death anxiety, 40.4% of them had moderate level of death anxiety and 51% of them had depressed mood. Mean death related depression score of those who were female, whose spouse was dead and who did not want to know that they had a terminal illness was higher; than mean death anxiety score of those who were female, were single/divorced, were able to meet self-care needs semi-dependently and the difference among the groups was significant (p˂0.05). The highest mean score of death anxiety scale was in "fears of pain-process of death" dimension (15.80±5.17) and this anxiety was at moderate level. There was a positive and significant correlation between mean scores of dyspnea scale and death related depression and "the anxieties in relation to decomposition" dimension (r=0.231 p=0.018, r=0.222 p=0.023). As a result; half of the COPD patients experienced depressive mood and nearly all of them had mild and moderate level of death anxiety. Nurses should follow up those patients who have high level of dyspnea, are female, do not have spouse support, have low educational status, have difficulty meeting self-care needs and do not want to know that they have a terminal illness in terms of death anxiety and death related depression. Key words: Depression, Dyspnea, COPD, Death, Death Anxiety