The Use and Evaluation of Haptotherapy by Cancer Patients

Objective To describe the use and evaluation of haptotherapy in a Dutch psycho-oncological center. Research questions (a).How many cancer patients are referred to haptotherapy? (b). Which social and medical background characteristics influence the choice for haptotherapy? (c). How do patients evaluate the haptotherapy they received? and (d). Do patient background characteristics influence the evaluation of the haptotherapy? Method An historical cohort study, re-analyzing patient-reported outcomes in the annual evaluation reports between 2007 and 2015 from the psychosocial oncology center, De Vruchtenburg, in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The use of haptotherapy was measured by direct questions to the clients. and checked with the client registration files. Satisfaction was measured on a scale from 0 to 10. Measured background characteristics were gender, age, education level, number of years suffering from cancer, and the medical condition of the patients. Results Of the 1202 clients seen during the years 2007 to 2015, 12% was referred to haptotherapy. Satisfaction varies during these years from 7.3 to 8.5 (with a mean of 8.1). Compared to other forms of therapy the haptotherapy satisfaction scores are quite high. Most of the background characteristics do not influence the choice nor the satisfaction of the clients. However, it are primarily clients who are not very ill who use the haptotherapy. Conclusion Haptotherapy is used less because of the limited capacity of therapists and the increased likelihood that haptotherapy may not be eligible for healthcare coverage. The generalization is small due to the missing numbers, as well as the fact that the data are only available from one psycho-social cancer institute