Self- Enhancement Educational Program for Health Practices among Patients with Fibromyalgia

Background: Fibromyalgia is a complex chronic condition that imposes a heavy burden on the self-enhancement and management abilities of the patient. Therefore, patient education is regarded as a crucial element of multimodal therapy. The aim of the study was to determine the effect of self-enhancement educational program for health practices among patients with fibromyalgia. A quasi-experimental research design was employed for this study, which took place at the Rheumatology and Immunology outpatient clinic at Mansoura University Hospital in Egypt. A purposive sample of 85 patients with fibromyalgia represented the study participants. Three tools were used in data collection ; Tool 1: A structured interview; Part 1: socio-demographic data and Part 2: Fibromyalgia Knowledge Questionnaire (FKQ), Tool 2: The Revised Fibromyalgia Impact Self-administered Questionnaire (FIQR) and Tool 3: Self - Rated Abilities for Health Practices Scale (SRAHP). Results illustrated that the self-enhancement educational program had positive effects on patients' knowledge level (4.22±4.75 to 15.21±4.35),, revised fibromyalgia impact (52.30±4.20 to 31.69 ±4.93) and their self-rated abilities for health practices (43.64±13.82 to 67.05±12.12) compared to pre-applying the program with P (<0.05) . Conclusion There were significant positive correlations between patients' self-rated abilities for health practices and both their knowledge and their total revised fibromyalgia impact post applying the self-enhancement educational program at P (<0.05) . Recommendation: Ongoing educational programs may be necessary to sustain improvements in a revised fibromyalgia impact and self-rated abilities for health practices.