Description): Women with the chronic disabling condition of Multiple Sclerosis (MS) continue to have health promotion needs even though they are experiencing a disease that has long term consequences (USDHHS, 1991). In fact, the need for health promotion interven-tions may be accentuated for this group of individuals, whose quality of life and ability to continue to live independently are often heavily dependent on maintaining what DeJong and Batavia (1991) term their """"""""thinner margin of health."""""""" Health-promotion interventions typically advocated to improve the quality of life for the general population have been assumed to result in the same outcomes for persons with chronic and disabling conditions. While it is true that women with disabilities face many of the same overall health risks as the general population, this """"""""one size fits all"""""""" approach fails to address how limitations in time, energy, and mobility force women with disabilities to make choices they perceive as having maximum payoff, given their sense of quality of life. To be effective and enduring, health promotion interventions must be individualized and tailored to a woman's abilities, resources, values and perspective on quality of life. The purpose of this three year study is to refine and test a theoretically and empirically-based intervention to promote the health and well-being of women with the chronic disabling condition of MS. A sample of 150 women with MS will be recruited to participate in a randomized clinical study to determine the effects of an intervention that includes an eight week health promotion/b-ehavior change component and three months follow-up phone support.
The specific aims of this study are to refine an efficacy-based educational and supportive health promotion intervention for women with MS and to examine the effects of the health promotion intervention on resources, barriers and self-efficacy, health behaviors, and health outcomes over four measurement periods - at baseline, immediately after the educational/skill building intervention, after three months of phone support, and at three months post-intervention.
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