Emotional control in selected somatic and psychiatric diseases.

THE AIM: was to assess the level of subjective control of emotional states among patients treated for dermatological and gastrointestinal somatic diseases compared to those with depressive and anxiety disorders. The results were related to the analyzed dimensions of emotion regulation in healthy subjects. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The reports of the conducted studies were compiled for a total of 310 people, including 120 patients diagnosed with a somatic disease (psoriasis, rosacea, irritable bowel syndrome, and gastroesophageal reflux), as well as 96 patients diagnosed with depressive disorders and 30 patients with anxiety disorders. The control group consisted of healthy subjects (64 individuals). To assess the psychological variables analyzed, the subjects completed the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire developed by J. Brzezinski. RESULTS: The study showed that the patients suffering from a chronic somatic symptom disorder, similarly to those treated for depression and anxiety disorders, differed from the healthy individuals in most aspects of emotional control. The patients with dermatological and gastrointestinal diseases differed statistically significantly from the patients with depression and the patients with anxiety disorders in relation to three dimensions of emotional control. Patients with a somatic disease are characterized by higher emotional and rational motivation, lower emotional resilience and lower emotional arousal. CONCLUSIONS: A chronic disease co-occurs with the emotional sphere of a person's daily functioning. Regardless of the diagnosis in terms of somatic disorders and mental illnesses, the way in which emotional states are controlled can be an important factor in the onset of the disease, coping with it as well as the treatment process.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy of Patients with Somatic Symptoms-Diagnostic and Therapeutic Difficulties.

In every somatic disease we can find a psychological element, just as it is not uncommon for numerous physical symptoms to occur in a mental disease. Nowadays, the patient is no longer just the "owner" of the sick organ but is considered and treated as a "whole". The interpenetration of somatic manifestations with mental health problems forces patients who experience subjective suffering, including mental suffering, from current symptoms to visit specialists from different fields of medicine, and their treatment does not bring about any improvement. Cognitive behavioral psychotherapy (CBT) is one form of therapy that attempts to respond to the needs of an increasing-in recent years-number of patients who demonstrate somatic disorders of a multifaceted nature. The co-occurrence of physical and mental disorders repeatedly makes it impossible to determine which symptoms were the cause and which were the effect; hence, it is difficult to establish clear boundaries between the categories of these disorders and diseases. The therapist, to whom the patient with somatic diseases is eventually referred, may be faced with a diagnostic dilemma, the solution of which will give direction to further psychotherapeutic work. The common feature of this group of patients is a strong focus on physical ailments, while omitting or almost completely ignoring the psychological factors involved. The purpose of this paper is to present the causally diverse circumstances in which a patient with physical symptoms needs diagnosis and therapeutic support from the perspective of a cognitive behavioral approach.