The Stress Coping Process of Patients with Mild Traumatic Brain Injury

Except for somatic, cognitive, and emotional symptoms caused by head injury, patients with mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) suffered from many other psychosocial problems as well. Many researchers had tried to interpret the individual differences of posttraumatic adjustment by neuropathological factors, but received unsatisfied result. Considered that problems faced by traumatic brain injury patients involved different aspects, Kendal and Terry (1996) suggested that Stress-Coping Model was an appropriated viewpoint to understand adjustments of traumatic brain injury patients. Based on bio-psycho-social perspective and Stress-Coping Model, a case study with 2 mTBI patients proceeded. The 2 patients received neuropsychological evaluation and interviews separately. Texts of interview were processed in accordance with content analysis method. Results revealed that there might be two levels of stress-coping processes presented simultaneously. The 2 levels were “coping with symptoms and other related stressors” and “making meaning out of head injury experience”. There might be some interactions between the 2 levels of processes. Besides, factors such as “patterns of physical damage and cognitive deficit” and “social support” might play important roles in those processes.