Questions and emotional expressions from patients and companions while participating in multidisciplinary tumor conferences in breast and gynecological cancer centers

Introduction: Oncological second opinions are becoming increasingly important given more complex treatment strategies, simultaneously more patients use complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), and many comprehensive cancer centers initiate integrative medicine programs. The present study focuses on analyzing the effects of a second opinion in relation to attitudes toward CAM. Methods: In this prospective study patients (n = 97) with a diagnosis of breast cancer or gynecological malignancies who had requested a second opinion received a questionnaire before and after the second opinion concerning their attitudes toward CAM. Results: The majority of patients had breast cancer (72.2%, n = 70). Only 6.2% (n = 6) stated that they had been informed about CAM by the doctors who treated them first, 21.6% (n = 21) had received information about it when seeking the second opinion. After the first opinion, 42.3% (n = 41) wanted to try CAM, the same proportion trusted orthodox medicine alone. After the second opinion, 24 patients (24.7%) wanted to try CAM, while 38.1% (n = 37) relied exclusively on orthodox medicine. There was a significant correlation between an increased patients’ need for information and interest in CAM (p = 0.02). Conclusions: Today, aspects of CAM still are very often no part of oncological first and second opinions. This might hence lead to discouraging patients to try out CAM and therefore integrative medicine programs in comprehensive cancer centers might be problem-solving.

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The INTERNATIONAL MISSION study: minimally invasive surgery in ovarian neoplasms after neoadjuvant chemotherapy

International Journal of Gynecological Cancer ◽

10.1136/ijgc-2018-000012 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 29 (1) ◽

pp. 5-9 ◽

Cited By ~ 15

Author(s):

A Fagotti ◽

S Gueli Alletti ◽

G Corrado ◽

E Cola ◽

E Vizza ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Ovarian Cancer ◽

Survival Analysis ◽

Minimally Invasive Surgery ◽

Neoadjuvant Chemotherapy ◽

Minimally Invasive ◽

Invasive Surgery ◽

Gynecological Cancer ◽

Cancer Centers ◽

Interval Surgery

ObjectivesThe aim of this retrospective multicenter study was to investigate the extent, feasibility, and outcomes of minimally invasive surgery at the time of interval debulking surgery in different gynecological cancer centers.Methods/MaterialsIn December 2016, 20 gynecological cancer centers were contacted by e-mail, to participate in the INTERNATIONAL MISSION study. Seven centers confirmed and five were included, with a total of 127 patients diagnosed with advanced epithelial ovarian cancer after neoadjuvant chemotherapy and minimally invasive interval surgery. Only women with a minimum follow-up time of 6 months from interval surgery or any cancer-related event before 6 months were included in the survival analysis. Baseline characteristics, chemotherapy, and operative data were evaluated. Survival analysis was evaluated using the Kaplan–Meier method.Results All patients had optimal cytoreduction at the time of interval surgery: among them, 122 (96.1%) patients had no residual tumor. Median operative time was 225 min (range 60 – 600) and median estimated blood loss was 100 mL (range 70 – 1320). Median time to discharge was 2 days (1–33) and estimated median time to start chemotherapy was 20 days (range 15 – 60). Six (4.7%) patients experienced intraoperative complications, with one patient experiencing two serious complications (bowel and bladder injury at the same time). There were six (4.7%) patients with postoperative short-term complications: among them, three patients had severe complications. The conversion rate to laparotomy was 3.9 %. Median follow-up time was 37 months (range 7 – 86): 74 of 127 patients recurred (58.3%) and 31 (24.4%) patients died from disease. Median progression-free survival was 23 months and survival at 5 years was 52 % (95% CI: 35 to 67).ConclusionsMinimally invasive surgery may be considered for the management of patients with advanced ovarian cancer who have undergone neoadjuvant chemotherapy, when surgery is limited to low-complexity standard cytoreductive procedures.

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Estimating the Valence of Single Stimuli: A New Variant of the Affective Simon Task

Experimental Psychology (formerly Zeitschrift für Experimentelle Psychologie) ◽

10.1026//1618-3169.50.2.86 ◽

2003 ◽

Vol 50 (2) ◽

pp. 86-96 ◽

Cited By ~ 21

Author(s):

Andreas Voß ◽

Klaus Rothermund ◽

Dirk Wentura

Keyword(s):

Simon Task ◽

Emotional Expressions ◽

Evaluation Task ◽

New Variant ◽

Game Context

Abstract. In this article, a modified variant of the Affective Simon Task (AST; De Houwer & Eelen, 1998 ) is presented as a measure of implicit evaluations of single stimuli. In the AST, the words “good” or “bad” have to be given as responses depending on the color of the stimuli. The AST was combined with an evaluation task to increase the salience of the valence of the presented stimuli. Experiment 1 investigated evaluations of schematic faces showing emotional expressions. In Experiment 2 we measured the valence of artificial stimuli that acquired valence in a game context during the experiment. Both experiments confirm the validity of the modified AST. The results also revealed a dissociation between explicit and implicit evaluations.

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