[Anxiety and depression in cancer patients]

ABSTRACT

As depression and anxiety can have profound negative effects on the functional status, quality of life, duration of hospitalization and even medical outcome of cancer patients, evaluation and treatment of these disorders are important. This was a descriptive study to assess the prevalence of anxiety and depression in cancer patients hospitalized at Isfahan Sayyed-o-shohada hospital. A toal number of 173 hospitalized patients were enrolled. The Beck Depression Inventory [BDI] and Zung Self-rating Anxiety Scale [ZSAS] were applied to measure depression and anxiety respectively. Data were analyzed using chi-squar test running SPSS-ll soft-ware. Prevalence of anxiety and depression was found to be 18.5% and 32.9% respectively. Anxiety had a higher prevalence among women [P<0.05]. Patients in the age group of 50-65 years old had the highest rate of anxiety [p<0.05]. Age or gender had no correlation with depression. Type of malignancy, duration of treatment and treatment method were not correlated with prevalence of depression and anxiety