The Effectiveness of Emotion Regulation Training on Coping Responses in Attenuating the Stress of Life Events in Patients with Peptic Ulcer Disease

Abstract

Background: Because peptic ulcer patients have maladaptive coping responses, this research investigated the emotion regulation training efficacy on coping responses in attenuating the stress of life events in these patients. Objectives: The effectiveness of emotion regulation training on coping responses in attenuating the stress of life events in patients with peptic ulcer disease (PUD) was investigated. Methods: This was a semi-experimental study with a pretest-posttest design and a control group, in which participants were followed for three months. Forty-six participants were selected by the purposeful sampling method from March 2021 to June 2021. Assignment in experimental and control groups was done by simple random method. The Persian form of the Coping Style Scale (CSS) was filled out as the pretest. The emotion regulation training protocol was delivered in eight sessions during eight weeks. Afterward, both groups were followed for three months. The ANCOVA test was run in SPSS 22 to analyze the data. Results: Findings suggested that emotion regulation training significantly decreased avoidance coping strategy (P < 0.01), active behavioral coping strategy (P < 0.01), and enhanced active cognitive coping strategy (P < 0.01). These changes persisted in the experimental group after three months of the post-test (P < 0.01). Conclusions: Emotion regulation training can affect coping responses in patients with PUD and improve their adaptive coping strategies and emotional functioning. Therefore, this short-term protocol can be added to the treatment protocol of these patients.