Cancer Progression And Survival A Biobehavioral Approach.

Cancer Progression and Survival: A Biobehavioral Approach Multiple epidemiological and psychological studies have investigated the relationship between psychological factors and the progression of cancer. Lack of social support, trauma history, depression, and distress and the most commonly cited psychological processes when looking at cancer outcomes. A meta-analysis conducted by Pinquart and Duberstein (2010) examined the association between social support and cancer progression and found that higher levels of perceived social support, having a larger social network, and being married decreased the mortality rate by 25%, 20% and 12% respectively. In contrast studies done on depression, stress, and trauma have consistently found them to†¦show more content†¦Inflammation is facilitated by the tumor cells as well as tumor related macrophages, both of which are strong producers of inflammatory cytokines. Kiecolt-Glaser et al. (2003), showed that stress related factors promote the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines. Leukocytes p lay an important role in inflammation and patients assessed to have higher depressive symptoms were found to have greater leukocyte expression in genes mediating inflammation., oxidative stress, and immune activation. Inflammation is also known to central nervous system effects that may influence psychosocial abnormalities in a cancer patient. Depression had specifically been associated with higher IL-6 which is known to induce neuronegative reactions in the CNS. Psychological interventions have shown to varying reliability and magnitude on cancer patients. Significant effects have also been observed for cytokine outcomes in relation to increase in production. Antoni and colleagues (2011), demonstrated that stress management intervention during early stages of breast cancer produced changes in leukocyte gene expression. Specifically, down-regulation of genes that promote inflammatory and metastasis processes. Another study observed that in breast cancer patients who experienced a recurrent diagnosis and had a prior intervention had a reduced risk of death (Andersen et al., 2010). All of this shows the importance of determining the biobehavioral relationships in