Relationships among Self-Care Competency, Presence of Depressive Symptom, and Health-Related Quality of Life of Korean Stroke Patients

This study was to examine the self-care competency, the presence of depressive symptom, and health-related quality of life and to evaluate the correlation of these measures among 146 stroke patients in South Korea. The analyses showed that mean score of self-care competency indicates a slightly lower level of self-care competency. There showed lower levels of self-care competency in patients with no occupation, hemorrhage or infarction stroke type, both attack area and with risk-factors or other diseases such as hypertension and/or diabetes. Self-care competency had a significant, negative relation with presence of depressive symptom, while self-care competency had a significant, positive relation with health-related quality of life. In the nursing practice, nurses need to pay attention self-care competency and the related factors for better qualitive care of stroke patients. Concrete interventions and strategies to improve the self-care competency of stroke patients are needed.