EFFECTS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL SUPPORT ON COPING STRATEGIES AND QUALITY OF LIFE IN INFERTILE COUPLES: A LONGITUDINAL CASE-CONTROL STUDY

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the effect of psychological support offered to infertile couples on coping strategies and quality of life during the IVF treat- ment. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The data presented herein are part of a larger data collection on the psychological impact of assisted reproductive technology funded by the Italian Ministry of Health (study reference number J33C17000560001). For the present study, the sample consisted of 101 cou- ples (47 support group, 54 control group) undergoing IVF treatment at the Infertility and IVF Unit, Sant’ Orsola University Hospital, University of Bologna, Italy. Psychological support was voluntary and couples who accepted were offered free counselling sessions by a psychologist every 15 days from the beginning to the end of the treatment. All participants were asked to fill in the Fertility Quality of Life Questionnaire (FertiQoL; Boivin, Takefman, & Braverman, 2011) and the Coping Orientations to Problem Experienced- Italian Version (COPE-NVI; Carver, Scheier, & Weintraub, 1989; Sica et al., 2008) during three pivotal moments of the IVF cycle: first medical consultation, beginning of the treatment, day of the Beta hCG blood test. Medical and personal data were retrieved by clinical records. Longitu- dinal differences between the two groups were assessed by a series of Repeated Measures ANOVAs. Statistical analyses were performed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences Version 26 (NY, USA). RESULTS: Groups were comparable in all variables taken into consider- ation, aside for education levels which were distributed differently with a higher education in the control group (c2 1⁄4 20.05, p < .001). Longitudinal analysis on quality of life and coping strategies measurements showed a gen- eral improvement of mean scores in the support group over time, whereas scores of the control group tended to worsen. However, results were statisti- cally significant only for coping strategies. Particularly, an important varia- tion between groups was observed for the ‘‘emotion focused subscale’’ (F 1⁄4 2.4, p <.05) that measures the use of coping strategies centred on the search for emotional support and the ability to accept and process one’s ex- periences. While in the support group these strategies strengthened over time, indicating a greater ability to ask for help and cope with stress, in the control group they seemed to weaken with scores decreasing upon the delivery of the Beta hCG blood test result. CONCLUSIONS: Results highlight that psychological support can help infertile patients to better cope with the struggles of IVF treatments.