The Correlation Between Social Support and Self-Care Agency in ElderlyPatients with Hypertension

Background: The purpose of this descriptive study is to investigate the relationship betweensocial support and self-care agency in elderly patients who are hypertensive.Methods: This study was conducted with 150 patients who were hypertensive aged ?65 whoapplied to the cardiology outpatient clinic of Firat University Hospital (Elazığ, Turkey). Patientinformation form, including sociodemographic and disease-related data, Self-Care AgencyScale, and Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support were used for data collection.Independent t-test for pairwise comparison, Kruskal-Wallis test for multiple group compari son, and Pearson’s correlation analysis for correlation between the study variables were usedto assess the data.Results: The correlation analysis made between self-care agency and social support revealedthat self-care agency had a positive and significant correlation with family support (r=0.944, P < .001), friend support (r=.380, P < .001), significant other support (r=.386, P < .001), and totalsupport (r=.406, P < .001). It was found that patients with high self-care agency mean scoreshad high mean scores of support from family, friends, and significant other and total support.Conclusion: This study revealed that there was a significant correlation between self-careagency and social support in elderly patients who are hypertensive and that social supportincreased self-care agency. According to these results, attention should be paid to the socialsupport used by patients who are hypertensive