Schizophrenia and Marriage, Marital Quality of Life- A Study from Central India

Schizophrenia is a severe, debilitating psychiatric disorder affecting not only the lives of the patients, but also of their caregivers. And in most adult patients, their caregivers are the spouses. It is a chronic and severe brain disorder that affects approximately one percent of the population worldwide. Our study was a cross-sectional observational study, aims at assessing the Anxiety, Depression and Marital quality in spouses with Schizophrenia, attending the Psychiatry Department at a tertiary care centre, in Central India. The major chunk of our study population were Males in the age group of 21-40 years belonging to urban backgrounds, with higher secondary educational qualification, coming from a upper lower, lower middle socio-economic class. These individuals were hindu by religion, and most were employed in jobs or had small scale businesses. Patients included in the study population were mostly females, with most of them having a duration of illness of 16-20 years and were married for >10years. Most of them had arranged marriages and were residing in extended nuclear families, with two or more children. The assessment of prevalence of anxiety and depression revealed major study population with scores corresponding to mild anxiety and absence of depression. These were negatively related to Increase in age of spouses, male gender, higher educational and socio-economic status as well as the employment status. Duration of illness and marriage had variable correlations, however Residing in urban areas, in nuclear or extended nuclear families with no children, and single earning member in the family and a comorbid substance use by patients had a positive correlation. We observed that the scores on the marital quality scale, were positively related to a lower age, female gender, lower educational, and socio economic status, along with employment status of spouses, urban location of residence. These scores were worse for couples in nuclear families with no children and lacking any additional social support These scores were positively associated with anxiety and depression grades. However, the 12 factor scores revealed, a high score in affection and understanding but a low score for dissolution potential of the marriage. An overall improvement in marital quality will not just improve the social functioning of these patients, but will also improve the understanding of their spouses about the psychiatric illnesses. This will indirectly improve the treatment adherence in these patients, as well as will help taking care of the care giver burdens among their spouses