Emotions do not affect cancer survival

Emotions do not affect cancer survival: study
Reuters, Mon Oct 22, 12:31 AM ET

People who are depressed about their cancer are no more likely to die
than people who keep a positive outlook, U.S. researchers reported on
Monday.

Cancer patients are often encouraged to stay as happy as possible and
many people believe that a positive outlook helps recovery and
survival.

Dr. James Coyne and colleagues from the University of Pennsylvania set
out to see if this was really true. They analyzed data from two
studies of the emotional states of 1,093 patients with head and neck
cancer.

Over the time of the two studies, 646 patients died.

The analysis showed that emotional status was not associated with
survival rate. A person's emotions were not associated with survival
even after taking into account other factors, such as gender, tumor
site or disease stage, Coyne and colleagues report in the journal
Cancer.

"The hope that we can fight cancer by influencing emotional states
appears to have been misplaced," Coyne said in a statement.

"If cancer patients want psychotherapy or to be in a support group,
they should be given the opportunity to do so. There can be lots of
emotional and social benefits. But they should not seek such
experiences solely on the expectation that they are extending their
lives."

.

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