Ohaeri J U, Campbell O B, Ilesanmi A, Ohaeri B M
Department of Psychiatry, University College Hospital, Univ of Ibadan, Nigeria.
West Afr J Med. 1999 Jan-Mar;18(1):6-12.
The paucity of institutional facilities and specialist manpower for treating cancer, implies great reliance on relatives, whose attitudes to the disease have not been explored.
To assess the attitudes and beliefs of relatives of women with breast and cervical cancer on aspects of the disease, the relationship of these variables to global rating of burden; and compare with responses of relatives of infertility cases.
In 1995, relatives of 73 women with cancer (41 patients with cervical and 32 with breast cancer, mean age of caregivers 35.6) and 33 women with infertility (mean age of caregivers 33.2 years) were interviewed in out-patient clinics at UCH, Ibadan.
Supernatural aetiologies were the most commonly preferred by both groups (P > 0.05). Cancer commonly provoked feelings of depression among caregivers, though most of them felt glad with their caregiving roles (98.6%) and had positive attitudes towards hospital staff. Cancer seemed not to provoke feelings of social stigma. Most caregivers did not like patients institutionalised. Global rating of psychosocial burden was not significantly associated with variables explored.
These relatives have the emotional disposition and social potentials for playing informal caregiving roles; hence there is a need to strengthen institutional capabilities for community-based treatment of cancer.
