Question: Dr. Felt, you reported on some work that explored illness perceptions and quality of life in Cushing’s patients. What did you find and how is this important to patients?  

Answer: We set out to better understand the quality of life concerns of patients with Cushing’s syndrome (and other endocrine diseases). We were interested in whether the way patients view and handle their diseases may affect their quality of life. We found that when patients with Cushing’s syndrome had more negative views (negative illness perceptions) about their disease and a more passive attitude in handling (or coping with) their disease, they had lower quality of life. We think that taking those views into consideration could be helpful when trying to improve quality of life concerns that patients with Cushing’s syndrome express. As our research progresses, we would eventually like to develop recommendations for medical doctors treating the quality of life concerns of patients with Cushing’s syndrome. This study was another step forward in our understanding of the experiences of patients with Cushing’s.

Endo 2016: Using the Common Sense Model of Illness Perceptions to Better Understand the Impaired Quality of Life of Patients Treated for Neuroendocrine Diseases, Poster Board SAT 502

Authors: John Michael Felt Jr.* (1), Sarah Depaoli (2), Cornelie D. Andela (3), Alberto M. Pereira (3), Nienke R. Biermasz (4), Adrian A Kaptein (4) and Jitske Tiemensma (1)

1 University of California, Merced, Merced, CA, 2 University of California, Merced, 3 eiden University Medical Center, Leiden, Netherlands, 4 Leiden University Medical Center, Netherlands

Newsletter: Summer, 2016