Abstract
Background: Limited research on psychiatric disorders prevalence among Upper Egyptian
women treated for breast cancer. To our knowledge, no studies published earlier from our locality
considering this issue.
Purpose: To explore the prevalence of anxiety and depression in a sample of women treated for
breast cancer and to find possible associated factors for these disorders.
Design: A cross-sectional observational survey conducted through an interview on 96 women with
breast cancer who visited the Oncology Outpatient Clinic at Sohag University from August 2016 to
December 2016.
Methods: Sociodemographic and clinical data were collected for each patient; Taylor Manifest
Anxiety Scale (TMAS) and Beck Depression Inventory-II used to score anxiety and depression,
respectively. Questionnaires managed and responses collected.
Findings: A total of 96 women with a mean age of 49.16 years old were included in our survey. More
than half (53.13%) had an advanced stage; the majority (95.83%) had breast surgery; 97.92% received
systemic chemotherapy; more than half (54.17%) received breast radiation and 53.13% were omitted
from hormonal treatment while 46.87% got it. Fifty-nine patients (61.46%) were disease-free and
26.04% had progressive disease on conducting the study. Nearly half of them reported depression,
anxiety, or both (46.87%, 49.96% and 32.29%, respectively). One-third reported an advanced degree
of depression, anxiety or both (33.34%; 33.33%, and 32.29%, respectively). As regards associations;
patients with progressive/relapse disease have higher anxiety and depression with sustained
statistically significant relationship in univariate and multiple regression analyses (p-value = 0.03
and 0.04, respectively); while hormonal treatment has a statistically significant positive impact on
anxiety alone (p-value 0.02).
Conclusions: Our survey supports an association of breast cancer and psychiatric problems as it
showed high levels of depression and anxiety among Upper Egyptian women with breast cancer
attending Oncology Outpatient Clinic at Sohag University. It shows that progressive or relapsed
disease is significantly associated with negative impact on both anxiety and depression while
hormonal treatment has a positive impact on anxiety alone.