[ comparison of self-esteem between male and female cancer patients]

ABSTRACT

Chronic illnesses, such as cancer, can cause changing in self-esteem. This study has been perform to compare the self-esteem between male and female cancer patients. In this research 101 patients [51 women and 50 men] with different types of cancer [solid tumors and leukemia] have selected by simple sampling method. The tool for gathering data was a questionnaire, with three parts demographic characteristics, disease characteristics, and Cooper smith self-esteem inventory. Data collection was done through interview, patient's charts and patients self-report. The descriptive and analytic statistics have been used and the exams were "chi-2" and "Fisher", through SPSS software. This study showed that the majority of cancer patients in male and female group have moderate level of self-esteem. There is no significant difference in self-esteem of men and women with cancer and the majority of them [84.3% women] and [%76 men] have moderate self-esteem, but noticeable difference between men and women is connected to the variables that are related to self-esteem, whereas, men's self-esteem has not any significant meaningful relationship with demographic variables, meanwhile, variables of being under support of somebody [p=0.005] and having caregivers at home [p=0.039] have a meaningful relationship with women's' self-esteem. Among the diseases' characters change or decrease in function of different parts of body has a meaningful relationship with men's [p=0.014] and women's [p=0.005] self-esteem. Constipation is the only other variable related to men's' self-esteem [p=0.071], but about women there are some variables related to the self-esteem of them consist of duration of amputation [p=0.018], anorexia [p=0.001], alopecia [p=0.027] and fatigue [p=0.021]. It seems that, in comparison between tow genders with cancer although the women's self- esteem is related to more variables than men, but, recognition and specify these variables can help nurses to design an effective care-plan to meet the gender-specific needs