The Effectiveness of Metacognitive Therapy on Disease Perception and Self-Care Behaviors of Patients with Irritable Bowel Syndrome

Introduction: Having the right perception of the disease can affect the patient's compliance with his or her illness and self-care behaviors by increasing compliance with care instructions. Therefore, the aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of metacognitive therapy on disease perception and self-care behaviors of patients with irritable bowel syndrome. Methods: The present study was a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest and follow-up. From the statistical population that included all patients with irritable bowel syndrome who referred to the specialized and sub-specialized center of Milad Hospital (Tehran-Iran) between March to September 2021, 30 people were selected by purposive sampling method and randomly divided into two groups (15 experimental and 15 Control group) were included. The experimental group participated in eight 90-minute sessions of metacognitive therapy by Wells and Colbir (2012), but the control group received routine treatment. Data collection tools were Bradbent et al.'s (2006) Perception of Disease Questionnaire and Cohen et al.'s (1991) Self-Care Behaviors Questionnaire. Data were analyzed using SPSS software version 22 and analysis of variance with repeated measures between groups at the significance level of α = 0.05. Results: The results showed that metacognitive therapy was effective in improving disease perception (p <0.01) and increasing self-care behaviors (p <0.01) in patients with irritable bowel syndrome and these results continued in the follow-up period (p <0.01). Conclusion: The results were indicated on the effectiveness of metacognitive therapy on improving the illness perception and increasing the self-care behaviors of patients with irritable bowel syndrome and its continuity of effectiveness. Therefore, therapists and health professionals can use metacognitive therapy along with other treatments to improve the characteristics of patients with irritable bowel syndrome, especially to improve the perception of the illness and increasing the self-care behaviors.