Reviewing the literature on clinical depression and cancer, psychiatrist Mary Jane Massie, of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, found that studies showed that serious depression depended to a large extent on the degree of physical disability, ranging from 23 percent in those whose lives were least affected, to a whopping 77 percent rate of clinical depression in those most severely affected. This normal response is part of a spectrum of depressive symptoms that range from normal sadness to adjustment disorder with depressed mood to major depression. If you are experiencing any of these symptoms, it's important to alert your doctor immediately. Having cancer is hard enough. There is no need for you to suffer from depression as well.
Help is available.
Anxiety poses similar problems of identification, according to Massie. The normal fears and uncertainties associated with cancer of possible death, disfigurement, dependence on others, disability and disruption of new relationships are often severe. As with depression, the most common anxieties are felt in response to adverse circumstances. 3 Doctors commonly try to manage their patients' reactive anxiety by offering information and support. Good pain management, through pharmacologic or other methods, is also essential, for anxiety almost always accompanies unrelieved pain.