ILLNESS PERCEPTION IN LUNG CANCER PATIENTS – study
UICC Abstract 2010
UICC2010-95
D. P. Pesut 1,*, M. V. Bulajic 2, B. N. Bursuc 3, R. T. Vusovic 1, D. Z. Bozic 1
1Research and Epidemiology, School of Medicine University of Belgrade,Institute of Lung Diseases, 2Laboratory of Statistics, Faculty of Organizational Science, Belgrade, Serbia, 3Psychotherapy, Mind Institute, Bucharest, Romania
Background: The Brief Illness Perception Questionnaire (BIPQ) is a 9-item questionnaire, which has not been used toassess illness perception in lung cancer (LC) patients (Pts).*
Objectives: To investigate a group of LC Pts in terms of their perception of the illness in the correlation with demographic features and the clinical aspects of the disease.
Methods: An observational questionnaire based study. Forty nine successive LC Pts with valid questionnaires were enrolled by mid January 2010 (35 NSCLC and 14 SCLC type). Each item of the BIPQ assessed one dimension of illness perceptions like the consequences, timeline, personal control, treatment control, identity, coherence, emotional
representation and concern. We used original instructions to score, and SPSS for Windows Version 16.0 to perform the analysis.
Results: The Pts’ average age was 62.67±6.944 years (range, 49-77) and male/female ratio was 2.5; 75.5% Pts lived in urban and 24.5% in rural areas. Tobacco smoking status (TSS) analysis showed 67.3% current, 22% former smokers and four passive smokers (54,76 pack/years on average). The overall BIPQ score = 38.99 (range, 27.99-67.99). The
highest item-related scores were found for treatment control (8.49±2.001), illness understanding (7.35±3.025) and concern (6.63±3.389), and the lowest for symptoms (5.16±2.875). No significant correlation between the BIPQ score and histology types was found. Despite TSS found, only 26.5% participants ranked tobacco smoking as the first cause of the disease.
Conclusions: The results support importance of further research of the implementation of the BIPQ in cancer patients aimed to confirm specific fields for proper intervention.
References: Broadbent E, et al. J Psychosomat Res 2006;60:631–7.
Disclosure of Interest: None Declared
Keywords: Lung Cancer, Patients (Groups, Information, Support)