This study aimed to explore resilience and its possible association with sociodemographic and clinical features in patients with narcolepsy type 1 (NT1).

Cross-sectional study involving patients with NT1 and age/sex-matched controls (comparison group). Sociodemographic and clinical data were collected through semi-structured interviews and validated questionnaires, including Epworth Sleepiness Scale (ESS), STAI-State anxiety, Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), SF-36, and Resilience Scale (RS). Different statistical approaches were used to investigate the relationship between resilience and NT1, and associations with sociodemographic and clinical features.

The participants were 137 patients (mean age, 38.0 years; 52.6% female) and 149 controls (39.6 years; 55.7% female). Compared to controls, patients had a significantly lower (122.6 vs. 135.5) mean RS score and a twofold risk of having low/mild-range resilience (adjusted OR=1.99, 95% CI 1.13-3.52). Patients with high resilience had similar sociodemographic and narcolepsy characteristics of patients with low resilience, but they reported anxiety and depressive symptomatology less frequently (4.2% vs. 55.8% and 58.3%, respectively), and their SF-36 scores were comparable to those of the comparison group. In patients, RS score was strongly associated with STAI-State anxiety and BDI (rho=-0.57 and -0.56, respectively), and weakly with ESS (rho=-20) scores.

The results of this study suggest that resilience may play a key role in patients’ adaptation to NT1. Furthermore, this study supports interventions aimed at increasing patients’ resilience, and provides a base for further studies, preferably longitudinal and including objective measures, directed toward understanding the relationship between resilience, depression and QoL in patients with narcolepsy.