The mental trauma of severe disease

According to a study led by LMU researchers, a majority of patients diagnosed with breast cancer go on to develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, and in most of these cases the symptoms persist for at least a year. The majority of women suffering from breast cancer develop symptoms of post-traumatic stress in the months following receipt of the diagnosis. The latest results of the Cognicares study, led by Dr. Kerstin Hermelink of the Breast Cancer Center in the Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics at the LMU Medical Center, show that such symptoms can still be detected a year after patients have been informed of their condition. The new findings appear in the journal Psycho-Oncology. In the multicenter Cognicares study, Kerstin Hermelink and her doctoral student Varinka Voigt studied a group of 166 patients who had been newly diagnosed with breast cancer. Over the course of the following year, the participants were assessed at three specific time-points for the presence of clinically significant symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The results were then compared with those for a control group of patients without a cancer diagnosis.