[Causal attributions and coping with illness in patients with breast cancer]

The aim of the present study was to investigate whether breast cancer patients who attribute their disease to different causes differ in their ability to cope with the disease. A semistructured interview technique was used to question a total of 107 patients, six months after the operation, about the psychological stress involved in their disease and how they coped with it. In addition, two further questionnaires were used: the Freiburg questionnaire concerning adjustment to the disease (FKV) and another questionnaire to register the causes to which the patients attributed their disease (PUK). The results revealed that environmental pollution was the most frequent and important cause of disease mentioned by the patients. This mainly correlated with depressive adjustment to the disease. The same type of adjustment was also frequently seen in patients who attributed their disease to individual psychic problems. Daily stress mentioned as the cause of disease was additionally closely connected with the desire for social support. In accordance with the poor adjustment in connection with internal causes reported in the literature, it was further shown that attribution to psychic causes made psychic adjustment to the disease more difficult, at least within the first six months after the operation.