ObjectiveTo describe the current status of the social support, and to explore the possible influencing factors for their social support, then providing scientific suggestions to improve the management policy for patients with chronic hepatitis in Putuo District.

MethodsAs a cross-sectional study of chronic hepatitis type B & C selected from Putuo District were collected data on subjects and social support situation.T test or analysis of variance was used to compare the continuous variables among different groups; Chi-square test or Fisher′s exact test was done with the non-continuous data.

ResultsOf the 404 subjects, the average scores of social support in total, subjective support, objective support and degree of support utilized were 33.67±7.18, 19.64±4.97, 8.00±2.37, and 6.03±1.98, respectively, all of which were significantly lower than the norm scores based on the Chinese adult population.The scores of social support in total were different among patients.The patients without regular income (t=－2.624, P=0.009), unmarried (t=－7.577, P < 0.001), divorced or widowed (t=－6.062, P < 0.001) had lower scores and the patients graduated from high school (t=2.095, P=0.037), with bachelor degree and above (t=2.554, P=0.011), with average family income from 2 501 to 6 999 (t=3.695, P < 0.001) and above 7 000 (t=4.374, P < 0.001) had higher scores.

ConclusionThe social support is low among the patients with chronic hepatitis in Putuo District. Measures should be developed to improve social support for patients with chronic hepatitis in community care.