physical, psychological and interactional suffering associated with lung cancer patients

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the study was to investigate the physical, psychological and interactional suffering associated with lung cancer patients. A sample of 50 adults with primary lung cancer obtained from Surgical Specialties Hospital in Baghdad city from March 1999-Augut 2000, two parts instrument was constructed and consisted of a personal and demographic data sheet that included descriptive information about patients. Other instrument was to assess the physical, psychological and interactional aspects for patients who suffering from lung cancer. A three-point Likert-type scale was used and weight was calculated to know the priority of the suffering for those patients. The results of the study revealed that the highest clause weight of physical suffering were for coughing [1.56], disability and loss of appetite [1.22] then for pain and fatigue [1.12]. The psychological suffering results revealed that the highest weight were for restless, unstable [1.18], fear of change in daily activities [1.08] then for worry about family and fear of recurrence [1.06]. About the interactional suffering the highest weights were for financial problems [1.18], and for the job problems [0.96]. According to the results of this study it recommended that to carry out other studies to investigate the changes in reported suffering as a course of the disease progressed in spite of that to replicate this study with subjects obtained from a variety of treatment sources with a large sample size to allow for comparisons of group by sex, educational level, and socioeconomic level, and the Institution of Service Education Programme for nurses to have adequate knowledge that enable them to find out the patients problem and to give effective care