The Effectiveness of a Resilience Enhancement Program on the Quality of Life Among Adolescents with Thalassemia in Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Thailand

Background: Thalassemia is an inherited hemoglobin disorder and is among the most prevalent genetic diseases worldwide. In adolescents, the physical consequences of thalassemia extend beyond physiological impairment and affect daily functioning, education, and body image. Objective: This research aimed to promote resilience and quality of life among adolescents with thalassemia, with the goal of increasing mean resilience and quality-of-life scores before and after participation. Methods: This cluster quasi-experimental study employed a two-group pretest–posttest design with a sample of 58 adolescents aged 12–17 years diagnosed with thalassemia. Participants were allocated to the experimental (n = 29) and control (n = 29) groups using a cluster-based approach at the district level. The intervention lasted 8 weeks. The assessment tools included the Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory and the Resilience Scale. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, including frequency distributions, percentages, means, standard deviations, t-tests, chi-square tests, and Fisher’s exact tests. Results: Baseline comparisons indicated no statistically significant differences in personal characteristics between the two groups (p > 0.05). Before the intervention, the mean resilience scores in both groups were low. The mean quality-of-life scores for the experimental and control groups were moderate. After participating in the resilience enhancement program, the experimental group showed statistically significant increases in both resilience and quality-of-life scores relative to pre-intervention levels (p < 0.001). Additionally, these post-intervention scores were significantly higher than those of the control group (p < 0.001). Conclusions: These findings indicate that the resilience enhancement program effectively improved resilience and enhanced the quality of life among adolescents living with thalassemia.