Effects of meditation on anxiety, depression, fatigue, and quality of life of women undergoing radiation therapy for breast cancer

Objective: To investigate the effects of meditation on anxiety, depression, fatigue, and quality of life in women who are receiving radiation therapy for breast cancer. Design: Randomized, non-program controlled, parallel intervention clinical trial. Setting: The ASAN Cancer Center located in Seoul, Korea. Intervention: The subjects of this study included 102 female breast cancer patients who had undergone breast-conserving surgery; these female patients were randomized into equally assigned meditation control groups, with each group consisting of 51 patients. The test group received a total of 12 meditation therapy sessions during their 6-week radiation therapy period, and the control group underwent only a conventional radiation therapy. Outcome: The tools used to evaluate the effects of meditation were Hospital Anxiety and Depression scale, Revised Piper Fatigue scale, and European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer-Quality of Life Core-30. The results were analyzed based on the principles of intention-to-treat analysis, and, as a corollary analysis, per-protocol analysis was conducted. Results: The breast cancer patients who received meditation therapy compared with the nonintervention group saw improvements in reduction of anxiety (p=.032), fatigue (p=.030), and improvement in global quality of life (p=.028). Conclusions: Based on the results of this study, an affirmation can be made that meditation can be used as a non-invasive intervention treatment for improving fatigue, anxiety, quality of life, and emotional faculties of women with breast cancer. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.