Identification of the process of threat appraisal in patients’ offspring with a history of myocardial infarction: A qualitative study

Background: CVDs are the main reason of mortality in Iran and in the world. These diseasesare rooted in the unhealthy lifestyle. This study was designed to understand and perceive factorsthat affect the preventive behaviors of people at risk of heart disease .Cardiovascular diseasesare the main reason of mortality in Iran and in the world. These diseases are rooted in theunhealthy lifestyle. This study was designed to understand and perceive factors that affect thepreventive behaviors of people at risk of heart disease.Material and Methods: This qualitative study is a purposive content analysis. Eighteenchildren more than 18 years old of patients with the history of myocardial infarction (MI)participated and were chosen with purposive sampling. Data were collected through deep andsemi structure interview based on Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) and were analyzedalong with their collection and with usage of Lundman and Graneheim method.Results: During content analysis process 140 codes were extracted. After reviewingseveral times and summarizing, codes were categorized based on the similarity andproportion, and finally 11 subcategories and four categories were elicited including poorlife style as a Predisposing factor of HD, going down quality of life, imposing cost tofamilies with HD and internal or external rewardsConclusions: Findings of this study suggest that perceived reward and severity of notperforming HD preventive behaviors in participants were high while perceived sensitivity inyounger people is low. Thus reducing the perceived rewards and increasing perceived threat ofrisky behaviors with the goal of performing HD preventive behaviors can be considered as aprinciple in education.

Keywords:

qualitative content analysis , protection motivation theory , threat appraisal process , people at risk of heart disease