Psychosocial factors and cognitive performance in multiple sclerosis: gender differences

Introduction. Being a woman increases the risk of developing multiple sclerosis, an illness where biopsychosocial factors (psychological stress, perceived social support, psychological well-being, coping strategies) may have a clinical impact. Aims. To assess how stress management is affected in remitting-relapsing multiple sclerosis and to analyze gender differences both in terms of stress management and patients' cognitive performance. Patients and methods. 42 patients were neuropsychologically evaluated with the Brief Repeatable Battery of Neuropsychological Tests, four psychosocial questionnaires and Beck's Depression Inventory. Two main analyses were conducted: mean comparisons between men and women for clinical, neuropsychological and psychosocial variables, and a correlation analysis between the psychosocial and clinical variables of the illness in the whole sample, as well as in men and women separately. Results. Men and women showed differences in the outbreak rate and in the attention/executive function domain. The correlation analysis revealed that the strongest correlation was between clinical and psychosocial variables when the group was divided according to gender. Any predominant coping strategy was not detected in the multiple sclerosis group, but it was observed that women had an increased tendency to self-incriminate. Conclusion. This study emphasizes the importance of assessing these remitting-relapsing multiple sclerosis patients both cognitively and psychosocially, differentiating them by gender.