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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychol.
Sec. Health Psychology
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2025.1564736
Social support and psychological distress of patients with pituitary adenomas: chain-mediated effects of self-efficacy and rumination
Provisionally accepted- 1School of Nursing, Shaanxi University of Chinese Medicine, Xianyang, Shaanxi, China
- 2Department of Neurosurgery, Tangdu Hospital, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, Shaanxi Province, China
- 3Xijing 986 Hospital Department, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, China
- 4School of Nursing, Air Force Medical University, Xi'an, China
- 5Department of Anesthesiology, Tangdu Hospital, The Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, China
- 6Xue Jiang, Xian Shanxi, China
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Psychological distress in patients with pituitary adenomas affects their quality of life and is influenced by various aspects such as sociocultural factors, personal resources, and stressors. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate the chain-mediated role of self-efficacy and rumination in the relationship between social support and psychological distress.The study was based on the Wilson-Cleary model of health-related quality of life and self-efficacy theory. We investigated 500 patients with surgically treated pituitary adenomas in three tertiary hospitals in Shaanxi Province, China. We used the "Social Support" and "General Self-Efficacy" scales, "Rumination Scale", and the "Psychological Distress in Patients with Pituitary Adenomas" questionnaire to conduct the survey, and the data were analyzed using structural equation modeling and bootstrap methods to examine the relationships between the variables.The results showed that there was a significant positive correlation between social support and self-efficacy, social support and self-efficacy negatively predicted rumination and psychological distress, respectively. Rumination significant positive correlation with psychological distress, and social support, indirectly affected psychological distress through the chain-mediated effect of self-efficacy and rumination. This represents a compound multiple mediating effect on psychological distress.Discussion: Clinical practitioners should enhance social support for patients with pituitary adenomas, improve patients' self-efficacy, and mitigate rumination to reduce patients' psychological distress.
Keywords: social support, psychological distress, pituitary adenomas, self-efficacy, rumination
Received: 23 Jan 2025; Accepted: 18 Mar 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Zhang, Cheng, Zhang, Liang, Jia and Xue. 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: Jiang Xue, Xue Jiang, Xian Shanxi, China
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