[Psychoeducation among women with breast cancer and emotional symptoms]

Breast cancer (BC) is the most frequent neoplasm. As a consequence of the oncologic treatment, there are diverse adverse effects, as the emotional ones. Treatment options for emotional symptoms like anxiety, depression or stress are limited.

To analyze the effectiveness of psychoeducational workshops among women with BC over the anxiety and depression symptoms.

A randomized clinical trial by blocks with 42 BC patients in stages II and III of the disease, distributed into 2 groups of 21 cases (intervention) and 21 controls. There were 9 psychoeducational workshops performed weekly. It was carried out an initial and final measurement according to the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS).

For the intervention group, the median score for anxiety was 9.09 at the beginning of the study and 5.85 at the end (p = 0.0005). In the control group, the median for anxiety was 8.7 and 6.7 at the end (p = 0.0494). According to the depression symptoms, the median for the intervention group was 5 at the beginning and 3.2 at the end (p = 0.0216). For the control group, the median was 4.7 at the beginning and 4.6 at the end (p = 0.6359).

The psychoeducational workshops demonstrated effectiveness to decrease the symptom burden for anxiety and depression. Early education and counselling for recently diagnosed BC patients should be considered part of the treatment to prevent and decrease these symptoms.