The effectiveness of cognitive-existential group therapy on hopelessness in patients with multiple sclerosis

Background and Objective: Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic, autoimmune, and inflammatory nervous system disease. It leads to the loss of myelin in the white matter of brain, spinal cord and optic nerves. As a chronic disease with sudden and unpredictable attack, MS results in varies mood disorders including hopelessness in patients. Therefore, this research was aimed at studying the effectiveness of cognitive-existential group therapy on hopelessness in patients with MS.

Materials and Methods: This study was performed using semi-experimental and the extended pretest-posttest design. The statistical population included all patients with MS supported by the MS society of Mazandaran in 2013. A group of 20 supported females were selected using accessible sampling method, and they were placed randomly in 10-member groups of experiment and control. All participants completed the hopelessness beck (BHS) measurement test in both pre-test and post-test stages. The experiment group received the intervention in 8 sessions, but the control group did not receive any intervention. The descriptive statistics and covariance analysis were applied to analyze the data.

Results: The covariance analysis results indicated that the cognitive-existential group therapy causes a significant decrease in poor motivation sub scale of hopelessness in the experiment group.

Conclusion: According to findings of the present research, it can be concluded that the cognitive-existential method is an effective way of solving the emotional problems of patients with MS.