QUALITY OF LIFE, ANXIETY ANO OEPRESSION IN BREAST CANCER WOMEN BEFORE ANO AFTER SURGERY
Keywords:
surgery, depression, breast neoplasms, quality of liveAbstract
Objective
To assess quality of life, anxiety and depression in women with breast cancer before and after surgery.
Methods
Eighty-five women, inpatients at the gynecologic oncology infirmary of Centro de Atenção à Saúde da Mulher that awaited surgery were selected. Assessment of quality of life was carried out through the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy - General and Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy - Breast questionnaire, before surgery (while the patient awaited surgery) and approximately six weeks after the patient had undergone surgery. Symptoms of anxiety and depression were evaluated with the Hospital Anxiety and Depression sca/e. Statistica/ evaluation was performed with the Student's "t" test, Wilcoxon's rank sum test, Kruska/1-Wal/is' rank sum test, Fisher test, Pearson and Spearman's correlations and the ca/cu/ation of chi-squares.
Resu/ts
Among the 85 women included in the study, 64 a/so completed the post opera tive interview. Lower Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy - Breast scores were significantly related to anxiety and depression, while anxiety was significantly associated with depression. A significant linear relation between emotional, physical and functional well being with additional preoccupations related to
breast cancer, anxiety and depression has been observed. A significant improvement in Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy - Breast, anxiety and depression scores have been observed in the interview six weeks after surgery Although anxiety and depression improved significantly after surgery, these symptoms remained relatively common among patients (25% anxious and 14% depressive).
Conclusion
Quality of life has a tendency to improve over the first weeks after surgery in women with breast cancer. These women need to be fo//owed during adjuvant therapy in arder to evaluate the evolution of these symptoms.
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