Abstract

This study attempted to examine the changes of psychosocial adjustment to illness, coping behaviors, emotions and sickness impact of 110 kidney recipients in before(N=32) and following kidney transplantation operation(1 to 6 months(N=29), 6 to 12 months(N=23), 12 to 36 months(N=26) and comparing the difference between 78 posttransplant kidney recipients and 78 normal controls. It was found that there was no significant differences among four kidney recipients groups on psychosocial adjustment and coping behavior measures, except social enviornment, However on emotional and sickness impact measures, pretransplant recipient group exhibited significantly higher scores on state anxiety, trait anxiety, depression, ambulation, mobility, body carement measures than three posttransplant recipient groups. In comparing the difference between the posttransplant kidney recipients and normal control groups, on psychosocial adjustment, emotion and social impact measures, normal controls revealed higher scores on health care orientation and social enviornment than the posttransplant kidney recipients. But posttransplant kidney recipients were higher scores on psychological distress, depression, ambulation, mobility and body carement than normal controls. Finally, posttransplant kidney recipients showed more affect-oriented coping behaviors than normal controls, on the contrary normal controls were more problem-oriented coping behaviors than the posttransplant kidney recipients.