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An investigation into the adjustment of hospitalized tuberculosis patients

University of British Columbia

Conflicting viewpoints are evidenced in the literature regarding the adjustment of tuberculous patients. Many writers maintain that it is peculiar to the tuberculous, others that the same can be found in any chronically ill sample, still others that the adjustment of the tuberculous is no different from that manifested by individuals in the general population. This study attempts to clarify the above conflicting viewpoints by comparing a hospitalized sample with matched groups of chronically ill, general population, and arrested tuberculous. All previous studies reviewd by the writer in which a tuberculous sample was compared to a non-tuberculous group lacked either sufficient controls or adequate sampling. In this study, a hospitalized tuberculous sample of 100 cases was matched for age, sex, educational level and socio-economic status with 100 chronically ill, 100 non-tuberculous individuals from the general population, and 100 arrested tuberculous. The necessary information was derived from a Personal Data Sheet compiled by the writer. The hospitalized tuberculous, chronically ill and arrested tuberculous samples were drawn from the Vancouver General Hospital. A comparison of length of time in hospital for the hospitalized tuberculous and chronically ill was made. The Bernreuter Personality Inventory was employed, and its values and limitations were discussed. An abbreviated method of scoring was used that correlates highly with the original standardized method. The Personal Data sheets and Inventory were administered by two physicians in the case of the hospitalized tuberculous and arrested tuberculous. The head nurse of each ward administered them to the chronically ill sample. No means of identification were used in the study. Mean scores were computed for the experimental and three control groups of each of the size measures of the Inventory. A comparison between groups was made for each of the size measures and the significance of the differences determined. The comparison of the hospitalized tuberculous with the sample from the general population yielded a “highly significant” difference, for four of the measures and for the remaining two a “significant” difference, and the conclusion drawn was that the tuberculous sample was more maladjusted than the sample from the general population. “Highly significant” differences were obtained for four of the measures in the comparison between hospitalized tuberculous and hospitalized chronically ill samples. Again the hospitalized tuberculous sample was the more maladjusted. The differences found in the other two measures, namely of self-sufficiency and sociability were “not significant”, and it was suggested that scores on these two measures tend to be affected by the state of being hospitalized with its attendant difficulties. When hospitalized tuberculous sample was compared with the arrested tuberculous, “highly significant” differences were found for neurotic tendency, introversion-extroversion and confidence, and “probably significant” differences for dominance and sociability. The trend indicated that again the hospitalized tuberculous were the more maladjusted. With respect to self-sufficiency, there was no significant difference. The various clinical statuses pertaining to the arrested state of tuberculous impose certain limitations on the activity of the individuals, as a consequence, a lack of self-sufficiency might be expected.

Text

2012-03-09

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/41295

Psychology

University of British Columbia

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