The impact of chronic pain on patients and spouses: Consequences on occupational status, distribution of household chores and care‐giving burden.

Background: Informal care-giving by spouses has become frequent in chronic pain settings. However, the impact of pain on occupational, functional and health out-comes in spouses has not been systematically investigated.Aims: The goal of the present study was to examine the impact of pain on both pa-tient and spousal outcomes.Methods: In the present study, the impact of chronic pain on 114 heterosexual dyads was explored (patients: 59% females, average age=57.81years, SD=11.85; spouses: 41% females, average age=57.32years, SD=12.15).Results: Overall, both patients and spouses reported important consequences of pain on outcomes, including occupational status distribution of household chores and marital satisfaction). Almost 52% of spouses indicated a high-to-severe burden. A multivariate model with spouse and patient factors accounted for 37.8% of the vari-ance of this burden. In the model, patient disability (=0.36, p=.002), spouses’ change in occupational status (=0.26, p=.002) and spousal perception of marital adjustment (=−0.36, p<.001) were uniquely associated with burden.Conclusions: The results indicate that the impact of chronic pain should be evalu-ated both for patients and spouses and point to patient and spouse factors that might contribute to spousal burden, which might help guide family interventions in a more effective manner.Significance: Research has shown that chronic pain poses a significant burden on individuals, which increases their reliance on others for assistance. However, the bur-den of informal care-giving assumed by spouses of patients with chronic pain has not been systematically investigated. This study offers new insights into the impact of chronic pain on patients and their spouses, which might provide empirical foundation for the development of new avenues for intervention aimed at promoting adjustment in patients with chronic pain and spouses who act as informal caregivers

Understanding the Role of Ethnic Density Effect: Issues of Acculturation, Discrimination and Social Support

Ecological factors in psychological acculturation research are often neglected, although recent work suggests that context and acculturation may interact in predicting adaptation outcomes. The ethnic density effect—the protective effect related to a greater proportion of people from the same ethnic group living in a particular neighborhood—might be one such ecological candidate. The current study integrates these constructs by unpacking the perceived ethnic density effect and examining how it is related to acculturation in a diverse sample (N = 146) of immigrant students in Montreal, Canada. It was found that the negative relation between perceived ethnic density and depression was mediated by discrimination but not by social support. Furthermore, a crossover interaction indicated that heritage acculturation was protective against depression for those residing in ethnically concentrated neighborhoods but not for those living in ethnically sparse neighborhoods. This strongly supports an ecology–acculturation fit, highlighting the need to contextualize acculturation research

Unraveling ethnic density effects, acculturation, and adjustment: The case of Russian-speaking immigrants from the former Soviet Union

There has been limited advancement in the empirical literature unpacking the ethnic density effect, a social ecological phenomenon that may help explain some of the conflicting findings in bidimensional acculturation research. In this study, we developed a brief measure of perceived ethnic density in a community sample of Russian-speaking immigrants (N =269) in Montreal, Canada, finding it to be a superior predictor of distress to objective linguistic density. Acquiring social support partly mediated the relation between perceived ethnic density and lower distress. Furthermore, the relation between heritage acculturation and distress was double moderated by perceived ethnic density and time lived in the neighborhood.A person–ecology match involving heritage acculturation and ethnic density was related to better psychological adjustment for participants who had resided in their neighborhood for less than, but not more than, 2 years.Clinical and community research implications for using measures of perceived ethnic density and acculturation measurement are discussed

Marital Relationship and Quality of Life in Couples Following Hip Replacement Surgery

For the majority of patients with osteoarthritis, total hip (THA) arthroplasty results in a significant reduction in pain, emotional distress, and disability and a significant improvement in their quality of life. Little is known about how these recovery-related changes impact the spouse or the marital relationship. Methods: Twenty-nine couples whose spouse underwent a THA (29 THA) participated in a semi-structured retrospective interview designed for this study. They were each asked to recall the level of pain before and after surgery and to provide a numerical rating score for questions pertaining to the level of disability in seven different activities of daily living. Couples were also asked to list in order of importance the five ways in which the surgery affected their overall quality of life. Results: The spouses estimated their partner’s pain, both pre- and postoperatively, to be significantly higher level than the patient’s perception. The spouses perceived a greater improvement in family/home responsibilities, recreation and social activities, and in their occupation than that noted by the partner. After the arthroplasty, the spouses indicated that their lives had improved with respect to doing more activities/leisure (72%), because their partner had less suffering (59%), they had more independence/less caregiving (55%), it improved their marital relationship (52%), they had a better social/family life (28%), and they were able to travel (28%). Conclusions: This study indicates that THA result in a significant improvement in quality of life not only for the patients, but also for their spouses

Expectations and acculturation: Further unpacking of adjustment mechanisms within the Russian-speaking community in Montreal

Recent years have witnessed a significant growth in the Russian-speaking community in Montreal, Canada. However, little is currently known about the predictors of psychological adjustment in immigrants from the Former Soviet Union (FSU). In this study we explored the expectations that this group of immigrants (N = 271) hoped to fulfill in their adopted society, the extent to which these expectations have been fulfilled, and the impact of fulfilled expectations on psychological adjustment. We found that the degree of fulfilled expectations was significantly associated with better psychological adjustment independent of personality traits, language proficiency, and acculturation. These findings contribute to the literature on cross-cultural adaptation of immigrants from the FSU and highlight the potential importance of expectations for the study of acculturation more generally