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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Med.
Sec. Rheumatology
Volume 11 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fmed.2024.1473587

Psychological features of systemic sclerosis: results from an observational study

Provisionally accepted
Sara Romanazzo Sara Romanazzo Caroline Rometsch Caroline Rometsch Alessia Marangoni Alessia Marangoni Serena Guiducci Serena Guiducci Fiammetta Cosci Fiammetta Cosci *
  • University of Florence, Florence, Italy

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Objectives: (a) Assessing mental disorders, psychological distress, psychological wellbeing in patients with systemic sclerosis (SSc); (b) identifying psychological features independently contributing to the status of having the diagnosis of SSc.Methods: Two hundred SSc outpatients were compared with 100 healthy subjects. Mental disorders were assessed via the Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI). Self-reported rating scales were administered: Health Assessment Questionnaire Disability Index (HAQ-DI), Symptom Checklist-90-Revised (SCL-90-R), Psychological Well Being scales (PWB). General linear models allowed to verify which psychological feature would individually make unique contributions to overall status of having the diagnosis of SSc.Results: Major depressive episode/disorder, panic disorder were more prevalent among patients with SSc (p < 0.05); SCL-90-R somatization and depression were more severe (p < 0.05) in SSc; PWB personal growth, positive relationships with others, purposes in life were poorer (p < 0.05) in patients with SSc if compared to healthy controls. The final general linear model, accounting for 20.4% of variance, showed that having the diagnosis of SSc was associated to lower SCL-90-R paranoid ideation and poorer PWB relationships with others.Conclusions: SSc showed to present psychological features in need of assessment since some of them individually made unique contributions to overall status of having the SSc diagnosis.

    Keywords: systemic sclerosis, psychological distress, wellbeing, Paranoid ideation, Interpersonal relationship

    Received: 31 Jul 2024; Accepted: 26 Nov 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Romanazzo, Rometsch, Marangoni, Guiducci and Cosci. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Fiammetta Cosci, University of Florence, Florence, Italy

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