Journal Article

Assessing preoperative hope and expectations related to functional neurosurgery: a new questionnaire

Baertschi, Marc, Flores Alves dos Santos, João, Belayachi, Sanaâ, Burkhard, Pierre R., Herrmann, François, Favez, Nicolas, Weber, Kerstin, Radomska, Michalina, Canuto, Alessandra

2022

Overview

Background Despite successful functional neurosurgery, patients suffering from epilepsy or Parkinson’s disease may experience postoperative psychological distress and social maladjustments. Difficulties in coping with postoperative changes, even positive ones, have shown to be related to patients’ presurgery cognitive representations (i.e., expectations, hope). The aim of this study was to develop an instrument assessing various key features of surgery outcomes’ representations, namely the Preoperative Hope and Expectations Questionnaire (PHEQ). Methods Participants were patients ( n = 50) diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease ( n = 25) or epilepsy ( n = 25), candidates for functional neurosurgery (i.e., Deep brain stimulation, anterior temporal lobectomy). Two to three weeks before the planned surgery, they were administrated items assessing their actual state, preoperative expectations, and hope regarding surgery outcomes. They also completed measures assessing optimism, quality of life and mood. Results Exploratory analysis resulted in a 14-item version of the PHEQ composed of two factors ( representations , including psychological well-being and concrete representations , such as direct surgery outcomes). The PHEQ demonstrated high internal consistency and good convergent validity. Patients were more prone to express postoperative improvements in terms of hope rather than expectations. They generally focused on concrete rather than abstract features, although patients with Parkinson’s disease had higher abstract future-oriented representations. Conclusions The PHEQ presents satisfactory psychometric properties and may be considered as a reliable instrument for research and clinical practice.

• Publisher: BioMed Central,BioMed Central Ltd,BMC
• Subject: Behavioral Science and Psychology / Care and treatment / Clinical Psychology / Cognitive Psychology / Complications / Complications and side effects / Deep brain stimulation / Epilepsy surgery / Expectation (Psychology) / General Medicine / General Psychology / Health aspects / Hope / Humans / Management / Motivation / Nervous system / Neurosciences & behavior / Neurosciences & comportement / Neurosurgery / Parkinson's disease / Patient compliance / Preoperative expectations / Psychological aspects / Psychologie cognitive & théorique / Psychology / Psychology (all) / Psychology Research / Psychometrics / Quality of Life / Quality of Life - psychology / Questionnaire / Reproducibility of Results / Risk factors / Sciences sociales & comportementales, psychologie / Social & behavioral sciences, psychology / Stress (Psychology) / Surgery / Surveys / Surveys and Questionnaires / Theoretical & cognitive psychology