Câncer de mama e resiliência: uma abordagem psicossomática

Abstract

The concept of resilience refers to the capacity or potential inherent to all human beings to overcome traumatic or adverse situations, and keep on living growing and making progress. As breast cancer is one of the most common cancers in women, and because of the serious psychological distress caused by the therapeutics utilized to extirpate the tumor, in this research I tried to identify if the resilience factors described in specialized literature and selected by me as resilience indicators were present in the life history of fifteen women that were mastectomized and had no recurrence in the last five years. All women received conventional clinical treatment and participated in CORA s Psychosocial Group Program.(CORA:Centro Oncológico de Recuperação e Apoio: Oncology Recovery and Support Center). The results showed that all patients referred to the presence of the main resilience indicators in their lives: optimism, positive self-esteem, selfefficacy, spirituality and flexible behavior, as selected by me from specialized literature . Probably because of their high level of self-efficacy, none of the patients in this sampling referred to problems in the workplace after their diagnosis or treatment, contradicting breast cancer specialized literature. The conclusion of this study is that the selected resilience indicators were present in the accounts of most of the patients, leading me to suppose that the mobilization of positive resources of the personality as performed by the programs applied by CORA is capable of activating the person s regenerating strengths, promoting the performance of the immunological system and leading to the recovery of health, as well as a better quality of life. These data may be used as reference for new health research not only in relation to the treatment of cancer alone, but also in the approach and treatment of other chronic diseases