It is important to address various psychological factors associated with chronic illness. Chronic illness requires proper health management because it cannot be cured fully but can be managed by both patients and medical professionals. The bio-medical perspective emphasizes the cure of illness based on objective clinical tests and ignores the importance of the patient’s own psychological perspective regarding illness. Psychological Model of Illness highlights the role of psychological factors in adaptation to chronic illness such as, myocardial infarction (heart attack).
Psychological Model of Illness attempts to understand the illness behavior of myocardial infarction patients. It provides an empirical investigation of illness cognition, personality, coping and health related effects on quality of life. The findings reported in this book are empirically confirmed and also make sense intuitively and experimentally.
Psychological Model of Illness provides a good blend of both quantitative and qualitative methods. The qualitative analysis indicates a number of ways in which the investigation of illness cognition, coping and health related quality of life might be viewed in a cultural context.
