Volunteers' experiences of becoming arthritis self-management lay leaders: "It's almost as if I've stopped aging and started to get younger!"

Abstract

Objective: To determine whether undergoing training to become a lay leader and conducting an arthritis self-management course is associated with improvements in physical and psychological health status, arthritis self-efficacy, use of self-management techniques, and visits to the general practitioner. In addition, we aimed to describe the experiences of training and course delivery from the older volunteers' perspective.

Methods: 21 participants completed all assessments and had a median age of 58, median disease duration of 10 years, and either osteoarthritis (n = 13) or rheumatoid arthritis (n = 8). The study was a pretest-posttest design with qualitative data collected at 3 points in time: before training, 6 weeks after training, and 6 months after training. Quantitative data were collected through self-administered postal questionnaires at baseline and 6-month followup.

Result: Six months after training, participants reported small, significant increases in arthritis self-efficacy for pain (P = 0.002), cognitive symptom management (P = 0.004), and communication with their physician (P = 0.024) and a small, significant decrease in depressed mood (P = 0.04). Qualitative data supported these findings, with participants reporting more confidence, happiness, and a changed outlook on life in general. Volunteerism was associated with altruistic behavior and with filling the vocational void caused by retirement.

Conclusion: Findings support the value of volunteerism and training to become lay leaders in arthritis self-management programs. Volunteers reported positive changes both in themselves and in course participants. They enjoyed helping similar others and being involved in a worthwhile activity, and they valued their newly acquired status as lay leaders. Many had begun to apply their newfound knowledge about self-management to their own situation, reporting less pain and more willingness "to get on with life."