Living in It, Living With It, and Moving on: Dimensions of Meaning During Chemotherapy

Abstract

The study results suggest the potential value of exploring each woman's inner world of meanings in relation to her sense of self, relationships with others, resources, and coping strategies during treatment for breast cancer. Because existential and situational meanings are an integral part of women's experience, the nurse's role is to create an environment that permits and facilitates dialogue about these dimensions of meaning.

Quality of life in newly diagnosed cancer patients waiting for surgery is seriously impaired

“…Probably, patients and may be doctors as well, prefer to underline the most positive scenario. The negative influence of cohabitation on QL might be caused by concerns about family and children, which are an important source of distress in cancer patients [29].…”

Chemotherapy‐induced alopecia and effects on quality of life among women with breast cancer: a literature review

“…Firstly, chemotherapy-induced hair loss is considered to be the most important side effects of chemotherapy, frequently ranking among the first three for breast cancer patients [16,19,25,26,29,30,39] and can lead to refusal of chemotherapy [3,20]. Secondly, it is described by breast cancer women as causing distress and as being traumatizing [5,[8][9][10][11]13,31,35,36]. Thirdly, there might be an impact on body image [17,40] although not all studies reported this association [14].…”

“…Patients described hair loss as traumatizing and distressing [5,[8][9][10][11]13,35,36]. Indeed, it was described as harder than losing a breast [3,13].…”

“…It is also a visible reminder of the disease [5,8,10] and confronts patients with seriousness of cancer [10].…”

A qualitative study of the experience of self‐hypnosis or Johrei in metastatic breast cancer using interpretative phenomenological analysis

“…The literature is fairly comprehensive regarding how women diagnosed with breast cancer cope with the initial diagnosis and the disease. Using qualitative methodologies research-ers have elicited the meanings that women subscribe to in coping with their disease (Jensen, Back-Petterson and Segesten, 2000;Landmark, Standmark and Wahl, 2001;Richer and Ezer, 2002). Studies point to the fact that women find meaning in their disease through at least eight categories.…”