Cardiovascular Responses of Women with Fibromyalgia to a Laboratory Stressor: Does Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Comorbidity Matter?

OBJECTIVES: This study compared cardiovascular responses to a laboratory trauma-unrelated stressor of two groups of women diagnosed with fibromyalgia (FM), one of them with comorbid post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), with a group of healthy controls in order to detect the possible existence of differences linked to comorbidity. DESIGN: Case-controls. METHODS: Eighteen women diagnosed with FM and comorbid PTSD, 18 women diagnosed with FM and no PTSD, and 38 healthy women were exposed to an arithmetic task with harassment while blood pressure and heart rate were measured during task exposure and recovery. RESULTS: Although heart rate response evidenced a general blunted reactivity for both groups of FM patients, only those with comorbid PTSD presented lower levels of reactivity in terms of their systolic blood pressure response. In addition, systolic blood pressure response was sensitive to the presence of depression in both groups of FM patients and controls. Finally, although both groups of FM patients showed significantly slower rates of recovery, their final recovery state was not worse after twelve minutes of recording. CONCLUSIONS: Results of this study point to comorbid PTSD as a significant contributor to the blunted cardiovascular reactivity observed in FM patients, which may be dependent to a great extent on depressive symptomatology. As some degree of cardiovascular response to stress is functional in that it mobilizes energy and triggers the necessary compensatory mechanisms to manage stressors, this study supports the well-recognized clinical strategies of detection and treatment of PTSD and concomitant depression in the management of FM.

Burnout and Quality of Life in Professionals Working in Nursing Homes: The Moderating Effect of Stereotypes.

Objective: This study aimed to analyse how stereotypes towards older people moderate the relationship between burnout and quality of life (QoL) of professionals working in nursing homes. Method: A total of 312 professionals were asked to complete questionnaires of burnout Maslach Burnout Inventory quality of Life (QPL-35) and aging stereotypes (CENVE). The moderation effects were tested using linear regression models. Results: A negative association was observed between burnout and QoL. It was also found a statistically significant moderator effect of the total score of stereotypes and the health stereotypes, besides a marginally statistically significant moderator effect for motivational stereotypes. The moderator effects were different for people with low and high negative stereotypes. QoL was more affected under conditions of high burnout, in which people with more negative stereotypes tended to present higher QoL than people with lower negative stereotypes. Conclusion: Highly burned-out professionals in nursing homes may avoid their negative feelings projecting them to residents through stereotypes, as a way of coping with burnout and increasing their QoL. However, this mechanism is an "aggressive reaction" and may have negative effects for both the older adult and the professional. The comprehension of these variables is essential for developing adequate intervention programs.

Older People's Personal Strengths During the First Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic.

BACKGROUND: Although several biopsychosocial variables could play an important role as risk and protective factors of mental health, COVID-19 outbreak studies among older people have seldom focused on protective factors. The purpose of this study was to analyze how older adults' personal strengths predict their well-being and emotional distress. METHOD: 783 Spanish people aged 60 and over completed a survey that included sociodemographic characteristics, perceived health, direct or indirect infection by COVID-19, resilience, gratitude, experiential avoidance, family functioning, emotional distress and well-being. Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was performed. SEM invariance was also used to analyze whether there were differences between older people affected by COVID-19 and those not affected. RESULTS: The best model supports the mediation effect of resilience, gratitude and experiential avoidance on older people's well-being and emotional distress. Whether participants or relatives had been infected by the virus or not did not affect the results. CONCLUSIONS: Variables used as criteria in older adults are related to well-being and emotional distress, but only indirectly and mediated by resilience, gratitude and experiential avoidance. This confirms the importance of considering psychological strengths in older people's well-being. Interventions focused on these personal resources should be considered.

Generalized hypervigilance in fibromyalgia patients: an experimental analysis with the emotional Stroop paradigm.

OBJECTIVE: In recent years, a good deal of serious research has been carried out on the hypothesized presence of generalized hypervigilance to sensory stimulation in fibromyalgia (FM). However, there are no studies which, following an operationalization of generalized hypervigilance as a propensity to attend to any task-irrelevant stimuli presented, make use of interference paradigms as the most appropriate experimental models for its analysis. The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis of generalized hypervigilance in FM using the emotional modification of the Stroop task and to explore the possible mediating role of anxiety. METHODS: To this end, 25 women diagnosed with fibromyalgia and 25 matched controls were shown 32 stimulus words equally distributed in four categories: fibromyalgia symptoms, arousing-negative (A-), arousing-positive (A+), and neutral (N). These words had been selected on the basis of the results of an independent study. In addition to the emotional Stroop task, measures of trait and state anxiety were included. RESULTS: The results showed the possible presence of a generalized hypervigilance response in fibromyalgia patients based on significant slowness in the color-naming. This effect was mediated by the degree of perceived unpleasantness of the A-stimuli. However, the expected mediation effect of anxiety was not found. CONCLUSIONS: These results suggest the presence of a generalized hypervigilance response in FM patients that is not mediated by anxiety. Implications for the correct functioning of controlled self-regulatory processes in fibromyalgia and similar pathologies are discussed.