Psycho-oncology
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A growing body of research suggests that staff working in adult oncology services are at risk of burnout and psychiatric morbidity, but whether or not these findings can be generalised to staff working in paediatric oncology is questionable. This paper reports the findings of a comprehensive review of the literature on burnout, psychiatric morbidity, and sources of work-related stress in paediatric oncology staff. ⋯ The evidence on stress and burnout in paediatric oncology staff is extremely limited. In order to devise appropriate and effective interventions to support staff, we need to have a much better understanding of the level of burnout and psychiatric morbidity experienced by all members of the paediatric oncology multi-disciplinary team, as well as the factors that contribute to these experiences.
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Provision of supportive care to meet patients' individual needs is instrumental to enhancing their quality of life. We therefore need an appropriate assessment tool to measure such needs. The purpose of this study was to examine the psychometric property of the Japanese version of the Short-form Supportive Care Needs Survey questionnaire (SCNS-SF34-J). ⋯ The results indicated that SCNS-SF34-J is a valid and reliable tool for assessing the supportive care needs of Japanese cancer patients.
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The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate the cognitive effects of adjuvant hormonal therapies in breast cancer patients. ⋯ These data suggest that hormonal therapies exert a subtle negative influence on cognition in breast cancer patients. Further analyses indicated that this effect was not fully accounted for by demographic factors or fatigue. Methodological limitations of the current study are addressed, along with recommendations for future studies in this area.
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Multicenter Study
Fear of recurrence and psychological distress in head and neck cancer patients and their carers.
Fear of recurrence (FOR) has been increasingly recognised as an issue of significant burden for most cancer patients, and has been associated with psychological morbidity and reduced quality of life. More recently, the impact of recurrence fears has been indicated in the families of cancer patients. However, there has been a lack of prospective research. ⋯ The preliminary results establish that early fears and distress within individuals govern later reports on these same attributes, but that there is some weak evidence of influence from one attribute to another within and across individuals in the dyad. Future prospective dyadic research is warranted to ascertain the level of these fears over an extended time and their relationship to patient and carer adaptation. Intervention may be needed to reduce this disease concern to a manageable level at an early stage of the illness trajectory.
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The University of California, San Diego, Moores Cancer Center implemented a systematic approach for patients to communicate with their health-care team in real-time regarding psychosocial problem-related distress using touch-screen technology. The purpose of this report is to describe our experience in implementing touch-screen problem-related distress screening as the standard of care for all outpatients in a health-care setting. Although early identification of distress has recently gained wide attention, the practical issues of implementing psychosocial screening with and without the use of technology have not been fully addressed or investigated. ⋯ We found that it is feasible to implement a computerized problem-related distress screening program in a comprehensive cancer center.