Relationship Of Posttraumatic Stress And Growth In Childhood Cancer Survivors

0509068 - PSÚ 2020 RIV US eng A - Abstract
Koutná, Veronika - Vobořil, Dalibor - Blatný, Marek - Jelínek, Martin
Relationship Of Posttraumatic Stress And Growth In Childhood Cancer Survivors.
Journal of Psychosocial Oncology Research and Practice. Vol. S1. Wolters Kluwer Health, Inc., 2019. s. 136-136.
[World Congress of Psycho-Oncology /21./. 23.09.2019-26.09.2019, Banff]
R&D Projects: GA ČR(CZ) GA19-06524S
Institutional support: RVO:68081740
Keywords : posttraumatic stress * posttraumatic growth * childhood cancer survivors
OECD category: Psychology (including human - machine relations)

Although some theories assume a connection of posttraumatic growth (PTG) with posttraumatic stress (PTS), the relationship of PTS and PTG has not been clearly proven yet and the presence of PTG does not necessarily indicate a decrease of distress. The goal of this study is to help clarify the relationship of PTS and PTG in childhood cancer survivors. The study included 167 childhood cancer survivors aged 11-27 years who were administered the questionnaire assessing posttraumatic stress symptoms (UCLA_PTSD) and posttraumatic growth (BFSC). Respondents were divided into three groups based on the severity of their posttraumatic stress symptoms (no, mild, moderate) and these groups were then compared by analysis of variance in the degree of posttraumatic growth. The results did not show statistically significant difference in the level of PTG between the three PTS groups (no, mild, moderate). These results are in line with the results of studies of PTS and PTG in cancer or other serious illness survivors, where PTG appears to be unrelated to PTS. However, the results may be affected by a low proportion of survivors with more severe posttraumatic stress symptoms preventing us from analysing PTG in the full range of PTS. Although the comparison of mean PTG scores in three PTS groups failed to find statistically significant connection of PTS and PTG, inspection of scatter plot suggests possible trend of reduced PTG variability with medium levels of PTSS.

Permanent Link: http://hdl.handle.net/11104/0299863