Evaluation of Depression in Newly Diagnosed Breast Cancer Cases in Hatay Province of Turkey in 2011

Ersin Nazlican,R Azim Okyay,Muhsin Akbaba

doi:10.7314/apjcp.2012.13.6.2557

Abstract

Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer death in females in Turkey. The main problems experienced by women with breast cancer are physical losses, emotional distress and degradation in family, work and social roles. The purpose of this cross-sectional retrospective study was to investigate the socio-demographical characteristics and depressive symptoms of 125 newly diagnosed cases with breast cancer reported to cancer control department of Hatay provincial health directorate in 2011. To evaluate the depressive symptoms the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) was used. All 125 cases who participated in the study were female. The mean age was 49.2 ± 11.9. The mean BDI score of the cases was 17.5 ± 10.6. The number of cases whose BDI scores were 17 and above was 65 (52.0%), and the number of cases whose BDI scores were under 17 was 60 (48.0%). The most striking finding in our study was that only 4 of the cases were receiving psychological help and support. The rate of depression was found high in our study and psychological support is a must for patients with a life threatening disease such as cancer.

Highlights

Carcinogenesis is a multi-step process involving many mutations, preferentially in genes regulating growth control, resulting in increased stimulation or removal of inhibition
When the stage of the disease was evaluated; in 5 of the cases (4.0%) there was in situ cancer, in 43 of the cases (34.4%) the cancer was localized to the breast, in 59 of the cases (47.2%) the cancer was showing regional spread and 18 of the cases (14.4%) had distant metastasis
We considered cancers localized to breast and in situ cancers as early stage cancers

Summary

Introduction

Carcinogenesis is a multi-step process involving many mutations, preferentially in genes regulating growth control, resulting in increased stimulation or removal of inhibition (tumour suppressor genes). The World Health Organization estimates that 7.6 million people died of cancer in 2005 and 84 million people will die in the 10 years if action is not taken. Having such a high mortality rate, cancer is a major public health problem (WHO, 2008). Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed cancer and the leading cause of cancer death in females (Jemal et al, 2011). According to GLOBOCAN 2008 study, with an estimated 1.38 million new cases worldwide (10.9% of the total) breast cancer was the second common cancer type after lung cancer (Ferlay et al, 2010). Infiltrating or invasive ductal cancer is the most common breast cancer histologic type and comprises 70% to 80% of all cases (Edge et al, 2010)

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