A comparison of different psychosocial questionnaires in patients with myocardial infarction

In a consecutive study of 140 patients investigated one month after myocardial infarction (MI), a battery of American and English questionnaires was used to measure depression, anxiety, sleep problems, health locus of control and perceived health. These measures were compared with a well-documented generic questionnaire, the Nottingham Health Profile (NHP), and a similarly well-documented mood scale, the Mood Adjective Check List (MACL). There was close agreement among all measures depicting anxiety and tension. The concordance between the measures of anxiety states and depression was lower. Depression and sleep problems seem to constitute separate concepts, since they are not as highly related to the other measures of anxiety. Because psychosocial factors are important measures for the outcome after an infarction, accurate assessments of these variables are required. Further research is clearly warranted to clarify the complicated interaction between psychosocial constructs and to improve the methods used for their evaluation.