title: Illness perception in tuberculosis by implementation of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire - a TBNET study.
abstract: How patients relate to the experience of their illness has a direct impact over their behavior. We aimed to assess illness perception in patients with pulmonary tuberculosis (TB) by means of the Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (BIPQ) in correlation with patients' demographic features and clinical TB score. Our observational questionnaire based study included series of consecutive TB patients enrolled in several countries from October 2008 to January 2011 with 167 valid questionnaires analyzed. Each BIPQ item assessed one dimension of illness perceptions like the consequences, timeline, personal control, treatment control, identity, coherence, emotional representation and concern. An open question referred to the main causes of TB in each patient's opinion. The over-all BIPQ score (36.25 ± 11.054) was in concordance with the clinical TB score (p ≤ 0.001). TB patients believed in the treatment (the highest item-related score for treatment control) but were unsure about the illness identity. Illness understanding and the clinical TB score were negatively correlated (p < 0.01). Only 25% of the participants stated bacteria or TB contact as the first ranked cause of the illness. For routine clinical practice implementation of the BIPQ is convenient for obtaining fast and easy assessment of illness perception with potential utility in intervention design. This time saving effective personalized approach may improve communication with TB patients and contribute to better behavioral strategies in disease control.
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, University of Belgrade School of Medicine, Dr Subotica 8, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia ; Clinical Centre of Serbia, Teaching Hospital of Lung Diseases, Koste Todorovica 26, Belgrade, Serbia.
authors.forename: Dragica P
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Pesut
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychotherapy, Mind Institute, Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Bogdana N
authors.initials: BN
authors.lastname: Bursuc
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Organizational Sciences Lab of Statistics, University of Belgrade, Jove Ilica 153, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia.
authors.forename: Milica V
authors.initials: MV
authors.lastname: Bulajic
authors.affiliation: Catholic University, Ruzomberk, Slovakia ; National Institute for TB, Lung Diseases and Thoracic Surgery, Vysne Hagy, Kragujevac, Slovakia.
authors.forename: Ivan
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Solovic
authors.affiliation: Jagiellonian University School of Medicine, Kracow, Poland.
authors.forename: Katarzyna
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kruczak
authors.affiliation: University of Porto School of Medicine; Chest Disease Centre, Vila Nova de Gaia, Portugal.
authors.forename: Raquel
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Duarte
authors.affiliation: Hospital of Lung Diseases and TB, Iasi, Romania.
authors.forename: Adriana
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Sorete-Arbore
authors.affiliation: Institute of Pneumology "Marius Nasta", Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Marinela
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Raileanu
authors.affiliation: Institute of Pneumology "Marius Nasta", Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Irina
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Strambu
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, University of Belgrade School of Medicine, Dr Subotica 8, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia.
authors.forename: Ljudmila
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Nagorni-Obradovic
authors.affiliation: Internal Medicine Department, University of Belgrade School of Medicine, Dr Subotica 8, 11000 Belgrade, Serbia.
authors.forename: Tatjana
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Adzic
authors.affiliation: Department of Lung Diseases, University Centre Kragujevac, Kragujevac, Serbia.
authors.forename: Zorica
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Lazic
authors.affiliation: Clinical Hospital of Infectious Diseases "Dr. V. Babes", Pulmonary Diseases, Bucharest, Romania.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Zlatev-Ionescu
authors.affiliation: Regional Research Medical Centre, Manipur, India.
authors.forename: Sorokhaibam
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Bhagyabati
authors.affiliation: Regional Research Medical Centre, Manipur, India.
authors.forename: Irom Ibungo
authors.initials: II
authors.lastname: Singh
authors.affiliation: Baranas Hindu University, Varanasi, India.
authors.forename: Govind Narayan
authors.initials: GN
authors.lastname: Srivastava
keywords: Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (BIPQ); Illness perception; Questionnaire; Tobacco smoking; Tuberculosis