Predicting avoidant coping in individuals recently diagnosed with serious illness: a cross-sectional study

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Health Sciences
• Medical Sociology

Background:

• Avoidant coping strategies are associated with adverse health outcomes.
• Understanding predictors of avoidant coping is crucial for patient support.
• Serious illnesses like cancer, neurological, and heart disease significantly impact coping mechanisms.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate if health parameters and socioeconomic status can reliably predict high avoidant coping.
• To examine this relationship in adults recently diagnosed with a serious illness.

Main Methods:

• Cross-sectional study using a nationwide survey linked to national registers.
• Inclusion criteria: age ≥50 years, diagnosed with cancer, neurological, or heart disease within the past year.
• Avoidant coping assessed via Brief Approach/Avoidance Coping Questionnaire; predictive models evaluated using Area Under the Curve (AUC).

Main Results:

• 13.4% of the recently diagnosed sample (n=746) exhibited high avoidant coping.
• High avoidance was linked to female sex, lower education, shorter life expectancy, and lower social support.
• Predictive models showed poor discriminative capacity (AUC 0.62) for high avoidant coping in this group.

Conclusions:

• High avoidant coping in recently diagnosed older adults with serious illness is not reliably predictable from health and socioeconomic factors.
• The findings suggest that other, unmeasured factors likely influence avoidant coping strategies.
• Further research is needed to identify comprehensive predictors of avoidant coping in serious illness populations.