The importance of enhancing self-efficacy in rheumatoid arthritis

Objective. To examine relationships among changes in self-efficacy and changes in other clinically relevant outcome measures. Method. Subjects (n = 44) were participants in a prospective, randomized stress-management study followed over 15 months. Outcome measures included self-efficacy, depression, pain, health status, and disease activity. Results. Correlational analyses revealed significant associations between changes in self-efficacy (particularly total self-efficacy) and changes in selected measures of depression, pain, health status, and disease activity. The observed associations were not due to changes in medication regimen or to nonadherence to the stress-management program. Conclusions. Evidence is provided that induced changes in self-efficacy following a stress-management program were signifcantly related to other clinically important outcome measures.