Abstract
For development of a system to assess and care for outpatients with mental disorders who underwent chemotherapy against their cancer, the usefulness of a program combining a distress and impact thermometer (DIT) used by nurses as well as interviews by psychiatrists were examined. The subjects were outpatients who came to the Hiroshima University Hospital to begin or continue chemotherapy from the end of June to December in 2007. One hundred and thirty patients agreed with this research. Of the 38 participants whose DIT scores were beyond the cutoff scores, 4 for distress and 3 for impact, only 6 preferred being interviewed by a psychiatrist. Two of them were diagnosed with major depressive disorder, and the others with adjustment disorders. However, only three of the six continued to use clinical psychiatric service. Among these who did not prefer the interview assessment, the DIT scores of half of them were under the cutoff scores. The degree of the participants’ satisfaction for the interview approach was not so low. The results suggest the potential needs of psychological support and the effectiveness of this program on certain subjects. For further development, it is important to weaken the psychological stress of patients to provide the necessary mental care and to strengthen the continuous supporting system for outpatients with cancer.
