Disclosures: Maria Nolvi, MD: No financial relationships or conflicts of interest

Background and/or Objectives: Sense of Coherence (SOC), comprising comprehensibility, manageability and meaningfulness, is important for the sense of living a good life and successful adaptation in persons with lifelong disabilities. Previous studies have shown that persons with Late Effects of Polio (LEoP) generally have the ability to understand, handle, and have the motivation to deal with stressors and problems arising in their lives. However, no study has explored the in-depth meaning of SOC in persons with LEoP. The objective in this study was to explore the in-depth meaning of SOC in persons with LEoP, in terms of comprehensibility, manageability and meaningfulness.

Design: Qualitative study.

Setting: University Hospital outpatient clinic.

Participants: Fourteen persons (mean age 73 years, 7 men and 7 women) with LEoP.

Interventions: not applicable.

Main Outcome Measures: Individual face-to-face interviews and a directed content analysis was used to explore the meaning of SOC in persons with LEoP.

Results: We found that SOC in persons with LEoP existed in two overarching themes that were closely intertwined; a state of motion and a state of being. The state of motion comprised active approaches, choices and actions, and was a process aiming to reach a stronger comprehensibility, manageability and meaningfulness. The state of being comprised the comprehensibility, manageability and meaningfulness that the persons currently experienced.

Conclusions: The profound understanding of SOC as both a state of motion and being will be essential for rehabilitation professionals when providing self-management support to persons living with LEoP, and possibly increase their sense of living a good life.

Level of Evidence: Level III

« Back to AAPM&R Annual Assembly 2022

PM&R Meeting Abstracts - https://pmrjabstracts.org/abstract/living-with-late-effects-of-polio-from-a-salutogenic-perspective-a-qualitative-study/