Screening of distress among hospitalized patients in a department of internal medicine

•We examine the association between medical illnesses and distress.•Increasing information on distress will increase quality of hospital stay.•Increasing information on distress will decrease the worsening of distress.

A psychosomatic approach to the basic screening of distress for patient care in hospitals and other health services is presented. The aims of this study were to verify association between: (1) medical illnesses and distress; (2) patients’ needs and distress; (3) type of illness and patients’ needs; (4) patients’ needs and sense of coherence. One hundred and eighty-nine patients (78 F and 111 M, average age 65 years ± 8.43) were assessed by self-report questionnaires. We found that higher anxiety and/or depression levels were associated with urogenital (p = 0.026), rheumatologic (p = 0.006), oncological (p = 0.011), neurological (p = 0.026) and respiratory (p = 0.013) illnesses. Higher distress scoring was associated with rheumatologic illnesses (p = 0.024) and illnesses of the liver and digestive system (p = 0.037) while a higher severity of distress was associated with oncological illnesses (p = 0.011). Depression/anxiety were associated with the need to speak to a psychologist (p = 0.050), to a spiritual advisor (p = 0.009), to be more reassured by relatives (p = 0.017), to feel less abandoned (p = 0.036). Only low sense of coherence was associated with the need for greater dialogue with physicians (p = 0.012), the need to participate less in treatment decisions (p = 0.041), the need to feel less left to one's own devices (p = 0.023). Several needs are associated with medical illnesses. In conclusion, these results indicate that early psychological screening could be important to avoid worse or chronic distress.