Role of Health Anxiety in Quality of Life of Coronary Heart Disease Patients

Abstract

The present investigation attempted to assess the role of Health Anxiety (HA) in Quality of life (QOL) amongst coronary heart disease (CHD) patients. The sample comprised 300 subjects: 150 patients (both males and females suffering from CHD i.e. MI or Angina), and 150 normal healthy controls (both males and females), in the age range of 30 to 55 years and from middle and upper middle class families. The participants were administered the Short Health Anxiety Inventory (Salkovskis et al., 2002) and The RAND Short Form Health Survey Questionnaire: SF-36 (Ware, 1993) to assess clinical and non-clinical health anxiety and Quality of life (i.e. Physical and Mental health-related QOL), respectively. Correlational analysis of the data revealed negative correlation of health anxiety with both physical and mental health-related QOL for CHD patients and normal controls.