Transits in Oncology: A Protocol Study for a Therapy-Educational Training Built-In Intervention

Abstract

The study “Transits in oncology” has been perfected with the collaboration of the UOC of Oncological Mammary Surgery of the Azienda Ospedaliero Universitaria Senese Siena, specifically by Prof. Donato Casella. The study means to analyze the impact of art-therapy interventions aimed at minimizing psychological distress in women with a diagnosis of breast cancer/mammary carcinoma (anxiety/depression), hence improving their psychophysical wellbeing. To this end, the study employs the evaluation of specific psychological parameters with the purpose of monitoring anxiety and depression levels, while investigating a potential correlation between the anxiety and depression levels and other psychological variables, such as alexithymia. The mammary carcinoma diagnosis, to all effects, constitutes an actual “disorienting dilemma” for the woman: it leads to questioning one’s way of life, and their past and future choices; the upheaval is conducive to a reflective phase that upsets one’s “expectations of meaningfulness”. The art-therapy intervention has been elaborated in a protocol that underscores its transformative methodology qualities: it aims to act on the regenerative potential of the turmoil, for an elaboration of trauma that does not negate it or further it (the feeling that nothing will change and everything will go back to the way it was before), but rather disrupts it. The final goal is to promote new existential practices, generating positive change towards self-awareness, stimulating the activation of one’s latent resources by accessing one’s symbolic world and one’s imagination.