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Dear Editor,
I read with interest the excellent article "Hope" by Professor Ian A. Cameron in the May 2017 issue of the Canadian Family Physician [1]. As always in this section we get a very good and hopeful take-home message. I agree that promoting "realistic" hopes is an essential aspect in personal life and medical care [2, 3]. Let us look again at the biblical references to hope, we find another interesting quotation. Proverbs 13:12 says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a tree of life.”
As we know, the multidimensional construct of hope is influenced by many biopsychosocial factors. In a recent meta-analysis with adolescents, for example, the following predictors of hope were documented with a large mean effect size: positive affect, life satisfaction, optimism, self-esteem, and social support [4]. In addition to sociodemographic variables (e.g. education level and employment) and clinical correlates (e.g. cancer stage, physical condition and symptoms), hope and hopelessness in oncological setting were also consistently associated with psychosocial factors such as emotional distress, depression, social interaction and support, quality of life, spiritual well-being, autonomy and control, as well as self-efficacy and resilience [5, 6].
A recent study of 347 patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) concluded that regular physical activity is a significant protective factor against hopelessness. T...
Show MoreCompeting Interests: None declared.