Social support for patients undergoing liver transplantation in a Public University Hospital

Abstract

BackgroundSeveral diseases may lead to the need for liver transplantation due to progressive organ damage until the onset of cirrhosis, resulting in changes in interpersonal relationships. Social Support for transplant candidates is an important variable, providing them with psychological and social well-being. This study aims to assess social support in chronic hepatic patients, waiting for liver transplantation.MethodsA cross-sectional study was conducted with 119 patients, for convenience sampling, from the liver transplant waiting list at a Brazilian University Hospital Outpatients. The information was collected through semistructured questionnaires, in four stages: 1) socioeconomic and demographic information 2) clinical aspects 3) feelings 4) Social Support Network Inventory (SSNI), to Brazilian Portuguese. The statistical analysis was conducted using ANOVA and multivariate linear regression analysis to evaluate the relationship between the scales of social support and the collected co-variables.ResultsAverage age was 50.2 ± 11.6, and 87 (73.1%) were men. Patients with alcohol and virus liver disease etiology had the same frequency of 28%. The MELD, without extrapoints, was 16.7 ± 4.9. Global social support family score was 3.72 ± 0.39, and Cronbach’s alpha = 0.79. The multivariate analysis presented the following associations, age = [− 0.010 (95% CI = − 0.010 - -0.010); P = 0.001], etiology of hepatic disease = [− 0.212 (95% CI = − 0.37 - -0.05); P = 0.009], happiness = [− 0.214(95% CI = − 0.33 - -0.09) P = 0.001) and aggressiveness = [0.172 (95% CI = 0.040–0.030); P = 0.010).ConclusionsThe social support was greater when the patients were younger (18 to 30 years). Patients with alcoholic cirrhosis, regardless of whether or not they were associated with virus, had less social support. As for feelings, the absence of happiness and the presence of aggressiveness showed a negative effect on social support.

A Correlative Study on Social Support and Quality of Life in Patients After Adult Liver Transplantation

“…Gangeri L and colleagues [20] explored the correlation of the quality of survival in liver transplant recipients and social support, the results showed that subjective support, objective support and survival were signi cantly and positively related to quality of life; Besides, Support utilization was positively correlated with psychological, social relationships, suggesting that medical personnel should pay attention to the impact of social support systems on the quality of survival to improve the quality of survival. Consist with this, researches also suggested that social support is positively correlated with quality of life [16,[21][22][23].…”

Estudo dos achados da ultrassonografia pulmonar, tomografia computadorizada de tórax de alta resolução e da função pulmonar em pacientes cirróticos com indicação de transplante hepático

“…Tais dados são semelhantes aos encontrados em pesquisas que têm por base a população em lista de transplante brasileira, americana e europeia. (3,4,5). Destes, apenas 27 tiveram disponíveis os laudos da tomografia de tórax de alta resolução em prontuário para análise, cujos achados estão demonstrados no quadro 1.…”

Alcohol Induced Fatty Liver: A Tragic Inception of Wrong Turn

“…Before transplantation, chronic poor prognosis hepatopathy can lead to painful consequences, affecting the whole family unit. In addition, daily family life undergoes sudden changes; parents, siblings, spouses and relatives are suddenly uprooted from their domestic ordinary activities and thrown into a strenuous routine of medical appointments, examinations and other medical procedures, which create an atmosphere of uneasiness, uncertainty and instability [77]. Patients who have received liver transplantation show a high incidence of de novo cancer, lymphoproliferative disorder and skin cancer.…”