Art Therapy Intervention for Breast Cancer Patients

Dr. Sarkis Meterissian

Status: Completed

Conditions: Breast Cancer

Treatments: Other: art therapy

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT01220960

10-049-PSY

Details and patient eligibility

About

As studies continue to debate the effects of quality of life on survival, increased attention is being focused on investigating complementary alternative therapies to boost overall total health in cancer patients . Art therapy is an interesting growing field, which has shown promise to positively influence quality of life in the pediatric and adult oncology population alike. As there is a paucity of well controlled complete studies in this field, the investigators propose to study the impact of art therapy sessions in women with breast cancer with quantitative and qualitative analysis of emotional health and physical symptoms.

The results of the investigators study will have widespread applicability to oncology programs that wish to offer/implement such sessions to their palliative and non-palliative outpatients in an effort to address the important concept of whole person care.

Enrollment: 64 patients

Sex: Female

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Any woman 18-years or older
2. Stage I to III breast cancer (first time diagnosis)
3. Minimum of 6 weeks Post Operative status

Trial design

Primary purpose: Supportive Care

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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64 participants in 2 patient groups

Art Therapy intervention group

Experimental group

Description:

For participants who will be part of the art therapy intervention, the art therapy group will be a closed group for eight women with breast cancer who are in treatment and recently have had surgery. The group will meet once a week for two hours over a period of 8 weeks, and will focus on exploring the expressive capabilities of art making in a supportive group. This group will be held in the conference room at the Cedars Breast Clinic. Each week will revolve around a theme that pertains to the experience of women living with breast cancer, and will be guided by the women's needs in the group. A broad range of art materials will be made available and various art techniques explored. No art experience is necessary. The intervention group will also need to fill out simple questionnaires before the art therapy groups starts and after the group finishes

Treatment:

Other: art therapy

Control Group

No Intervention group

Description:

The group not assigned to the intervention group will be asked to fill out questionnaires at two separate times (before and after the intervention group is run). The Control group will be offered the opportunity to join an open art therapy group upon completing the questionnaires.