Cancer, emotional responses and cognitive behavioural psychotherapy

Abstract

Cancer and its treatment is known to have a substantial psychological morbidity and, while adjuvant psychological therapy (APT) is well established, relatively little work has been done to investigate the effectiveness of psychotherapy, particularly cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT), for patients with cancer. This article focuses initially on emotional responses to the diagnosis of cancer, individual vulnerability and the prevalence of psychological problems in patients with cancer. The use of cognitive behaviour therapy is then described, together with key issues in its application and specific problems. The work concludes by considering differences in applying CBT to patients with cancer compared to patients with other physical illnesses and the notion of 'relapse inoculation'.