Comparison of Perfectionism in Patients with Cardiovascular Disease and Normal Subjects: A Case - Control Study

Background: Studies have shown that some personal characteristics such as perfectionism are associated with cardiovascular diseases. Hence, this study was designed with the aim of doing a comparative evaluation of perfectionism in coronary heart disease patients and healthy individuals referred to Shahid Faghihi Hospital in Shiraz. Methods: This is a case-control study carried out on 80 cardiovascular patients and 80 healthy people who referred to Shahid Faghihi Hospital. The sampling was done through the convenience sampling method. The Frost Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale (FMPS) was used to collect the information. Besides, t-test was applied to analyze the data in the SPSS software, version 16. Results: The mean ages of the participants in this study were 48±12.2 and 34±9.6 in patients and normal subjects, respectively. Negative perfectionism among the people with cardiovascular disease was higher than the healthy individuals (69.5±12.8 and 64±15.5, respectively, with P=0.03) and there was a significant difference between these two groups. In terms of perfectionism subscales, there was a significant difference between the two groups regarding personal standards (P<0.00), parental expectations (P=0.02), and uncertainty in acts (P=0.04). Conclusion: In general, our study results showed that there was no significant difference between patients with cardiovascular disease and normal subjects in terms of perfectionism, but a significant difference was seen between some subscales of perfectionism in the two groups.