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Cancer, stress and coping

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Stress and Coping in Nursing

Abstract

The word ‘cancer’ has been shown to have negative connotations, arousing negative emotions such as anxiety and fear (Brooks, 1979; Charlton, 1981). To be told that one has cancer is a major life event demanding major coping resources. Several authors have commented on this, for example:

The news of a cancer diagnosis often sets off a crisis in the patient. (Feigenberg, 1970)

Psychological reactions in patients affected by cancer are understandable. The reactions are characterised by the patient’s psychological helplessness and what cancer and its location really mean — consciously and unconsciously to the victim. The reactions with which we are concerned here are of the same type as others released by a traumatic experience such as natural catastrophes, fire, war-time experiences and the like ... (Caplan and Grunebaum, 1967)

however, the patient’s emotional response to cancer may best be described by what has been termed death images. Cancer, perhaps, more than any other disease, presents images of primordial suffering and terror that make it a uniquely devastating entity, both psychologically and physically. It is not as though no other disease kills, but this disease... has long been associated with man’s most unspoken and primitive fears, those of boundless suffering. (Wellisch, 1981)

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Authors
  1. Roy Bailey
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  2. Margaret Clarke
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© 1989 Roy Bailey and Margaret Clarke

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Bailey, R., Clarke, M. (1989). Cancer, stress and coping. In: Stress and Coping in Nursing. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-2941-9_11

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4899-2941-9_11

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-412-33830-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4899-2941-9

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