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Individuals receiving cancer chemotherapy encounter numerous stressors that stimulate a variety of coping responses and adaptational outcomes. Seeking information about one's diagnosis and treatment is one type of coping response, which was the focus of this nonexperimental study. Thirty-eight subjects receiving outpatient chemotherapy for breast cancer participated in the development of a new instrument to measure information-seeking, the Information Preference Questionnaire (IPQ). An additional 58 subjects were interviewed about their information-seeking practices and asked to complete the IPQ and two standardized instruments selected to measure how well the patient was adapting to the chemotherapy treatment experience. Information-seeking was found to be negatively related to subjects' age and severity of disease. No significant relationships were identified between information-seeking and the adaptational outcome measures of mood states and level of functioning. Subjects most frequently reported receiving verbal information about their disease and treatment from their oncologist, television programs, and the oncology nurse. Reading materials distributed in the oncologist's office, newspapers, and magazines were the sources of written information most often reported. Findings can increase understanding of the role information-seeking plays in adapting to cancer chemotherapy and enhance nurses' efforts to teach patients.
Marilyn Brolin Hopkins (Wed,) studied this question.