This Article Full Text Full Text (PDF) Purchase Article View Shopping Cart Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a colleague Similar articles in this journal Similar articles in PubMed Alert me to new issues of the journal Save to my personal folders Download to citation manager Rights & Permissions Citing Articles Citing Articles via Google Scholar Google Scholar Articles by Gotay, C. C. Articles by Albain, K. S. Search for Related Content PubMed PubMed Citation Articles by Gotay, C. C. Articles by Albain, K. S. Social Bookmarking                            What's this?

Impact of a Peer-Delivered Telephone Intervention for Women Experiencing a Breast Cancer Recurrence

Carolyn Cook Gotay, Carol M. Moinpour, Joseph M. Unger, Caroline S. Jiang, Dorothy Coleman, Silvana Martino, Beverly J. Parker, James D. Bearden, Shaker Dakhil, Howard M. Gross, Scott Lippman, Kathy S. Albain

From the Cancer Research Center of Hawaii, Honolulu, HI; Southwest Oncology Group Statistical Center, Seattle, WA; John Wayne Cancer Institute, Santa Monica, CA; Y-ME National Breast Cancer Organization, Chicago; Loyola University Medical Center, Maywood, IL; Upstate Carolina Community Clinical Oncology Program (CCOP), Spartanburg, SC; Wichita CCOP, Wichita, KS; Dayton CCOP, Dayton, OH; and the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX

Address reprint requests to Carolyn Cook Gotay, PhD, Cancer Research Center of Hawaii, 1960 East-West Drive, Biomed C-105, Honolulu, HI 96822; e-mail: cgotay{at}crch.hawaii.edu

Purpose A first breast cancer recurrence creates considerable distress, yet few psychosocial interventions directed at this population have been reported. The Southwest Oncology Group conducted a phase III randomized trial to evaluate the effectiveness of a brief telephone intervention.

Patients and Methods Three hundred five women experiencing a first recurrence of breast cancer were randomly assigned to standard care or intervention. The intervention consisted of four to eight telephone calls delivered over a 1-month period. The calls were conducted by trained peer counselors at a breast cancer advocacy organization, the Y-ME National Breast Cancer Organization, and followed a standard curriculum. Psychosocial distress (Cancer Rehabilitation Evaluation System–Short Form [CARES-SF]) and depressive symptoms (Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale [CES-D]) outcomes were assessed at baseline and 3 and 6 months. The 3-month assessment was the primary end point and is the focus of this article.

Results Analysis revealed no differences in distress or depressive symptoms at 3 months between the intervention and control groups; at 3 months, 70% of control patients and 66% of intervention patients reported psychosocial distress, and 40% of control patients and 47% of intervention patients exhibited depressive symptoms.

Conclusion Telephone peer counseling did not lead to better psychosocial outcomes. The persistent distress in these women supports the urgent need for the development and testing of more intensive or different supportive interventions for this group of patients.

Supported by an award from the Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research program (DAMD 17-96-1-6009); and in part by the following Public Health Service Cooperative Agreement grant numbers awarded by the National Cancer Institute, Department of Health and Human Services: CA38926, CA32102, CA35119, CA35431, CA35090, CA04919, CA35281, CA12644, CA27057, CA45560, CA35178, CA45377, CA63844, CA45807, CA46441, CA67663, CA58348, CA46282, CA12213, CA35192, CA52654, CA68183, CA35261, CA58416, CA95860, CA63848, CA86780, CA35996, CA16385, CA13612, CA42777, CA20319, CA37981, CA45450, CA14028, CA52654, CA58723, CA74647, CA58686, CA22433, CA58882.

Presented in part at the 27th Annual Charles A. Coltman Jr San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, San Antonio, TX, December 8-11, 2004.

The content of this manuscript does not necessarily reflect the position or the policy of the government, and no official endorsement should be inferred.

Authors' disclosures of potential conflicts of interest and author contributions are found at the end of this article.

CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Facebook    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?