Associations Between Self-Care, Caregiver Contribution to Self-Care, and Depressive Symptoms in Patients With Heart Failure: A cross-sectional and correlational study

Background Self-care in heart failure is a multidimensional process that may involve both patients and their informal caregivers. Although caregiver contribution to self-care has been increasingly recognised, the extent to which specific domains of caregiver involvement are associated with depressive symptoms in patients and caregivers remains unclear. This study aimed to examine the associations between patient self-care, caregiver contribution to self-care, and depressive symptoms among patients with heart failure and their informal caregivers. Methods This cross-sectional and correlational study included 200 patient-caregiver dyads comprising patients hospitalised with heart failure and their primary caregivers. Data were collected separately from patients in their hospital rooms and from caregivers in a private education room within the clinical unit. Data were collected using the Heart Failure Self-Care Index, the Caregiver Contribution to Self-Care of Heart Failure Index, and the Beck Depression Inventory. Multiple linear regression analyses were conducted to examine the associations between self-care domains and depressive symptoms in patients and caregivers. Results Patient symptom perception was inversely associated with patient depressive symptoms (β = −0.213, p = .011), and the model explained 4.7% of the variance in patient depressive symptoms (R² = .047). Total patient self-care was also inversely associated with patient depressive symptoms (β = −0.177, p = .012; R² = .031). Among caregiver contribution domains, caregiver contribution to symptom perception was inversely associated with patient depressive symptoms (β = −0.193, p = .027; R² = .036), whereas caregiver contribution to self-care maintenance and self-care management were not significantly associated with patient depressive symptoms. Neither total patient self-care nor caregiver contribution to self-care was significantly associated with caregiver depressive symptoms. Conclusions Patient symptom perception and caregiver contribution to symptom perception were associated with lower depressive symptom severity among patients with heart failure, whereas no significant associations were observed with caregiver depressive symptoms. These findings suggest that specific domains of caregiver involvement, particularly symptom perception, may warrant greater attention in dyad-sensitive heart failure nursing care. Further longitudinal and intervention studies are needed to clarify the direction and mechanisms of these associations. Trial Registration: Not applicable