MANY people have a morbid fear of cancer. This fear often results in anxiety and may even cause immobility when it comes to taking the necessary action of visiting a doctor for relevant testing. Yet, spotting and treating cancer early gives the only possibly chance of surviving it, and so it is crucial that those with potential symptoms decide to get them checked out straightaway!

A cancer research survey in the United Kingdom found that the poor one-year survival rates for cancer patients may be explained by the finding that people are often aware of the ‘alarm’ symptoms of cancer, but avoid or delay consulting a doctor until surviving the illness is next to impossible.

The research was published in the February 2015 issue of the British Journal of General Practice, and was conducted at the community level with over 4,800 people older than 50 years. The aim was to understand how people interpreted and responded to symptoms that could give an early warning sign of cancer in real life, without imposing or suggesting a cancer perspective on the patients being researched. Consequently, the survey did not use the word cancer, but listed 17 symptoms from the ‘Cancer Awareness Measures’.

FINDINGS

Approximately 50 per cent of the sample reported having at least one cancer-associated symptom, and many of them recognised their symptoms as possibly being associated with cancer. However, 45 per cent of the research participants did not contact any doctor about their symptoms, and gave various reasons for not doing so, including that ‘the symptoms were only intermittent and not continuous’, not wanting to ‘bother’ a doctor or waste the health services resources, the perception that frequently consulting a doctor was a sign of ‘weakness’, and the dismissal of the symptoms as being due to ‘ageing’.

The research found that some of the people consulted a doctor only after they were exposed to a cancer awareness campaign or after the advice of a friend or family member. One awareness campaign mentioned by people involved television and radio infomercials that described the symptoms of colon cancer, and one ‘alarm symptom’ that often caused persons to push a friend or relative to seek help was persistent coughing that was highlighted in a health campaign as being a possible symptom of lung cancer.

PERSISTING SYMPTOMS

Other persons sought help due to symptoms that would not go away, a feeling that something was wrong, or an awareness or fear of cancer. However, this fear of cancer kept some individuals from taking action, and others delayed seeking help for possible cancer symptoms until they visited a doctor for another reason. Still, some others became accustomed to the symptom and began to think of it as normal.

For many of the people researched, their fear centred on the possible effects that cancer had on daily life. Some reported a distrust of the health care system, while others cited difficulty in making an appointment and the short time they had to interact with the doctor, even to do a medical examination.

The researchers noticed that some patients had a great propensity to endure considerable discomfort such as a persistent difficulty in swallowing or bowel movements that were bloody, and attributed this reluctance to seek medical help as being characteristic of a British ‘stiff upper lip’. However, other research endeavours have also looked into patient delays regarding signs of stroke or heart disease, and so the findings of inattentiveness, or a failure or fear to address early warning symptoms of disease extends beyond the warning signs of cancer. Persons were just generally fearful of any symptoms that might suggest they were unwell.

LESSONS TO LEARN

Spotting and treating cancer tissues early means that patients have a far better chance of defeating the disease, and so it is important that we seek to understand why some people with potential symptoms decide not to get them checked out right away. By studying and understanding the behaviour of people, and why they do the things they do within a particular society, we will gain insight into the possible methods and actions required to motivate them towards taking the required steps to benefit themselves in the short and long run.

Certainly, research such as these should help in finding effective ways to encourage everyone with worrying symptoms to seek help as soon as possible.

Derrick Aarons MD, PhD is a consultant bioethicist/family physician, a specialist in ethical issues in medicine, the life sciences and research, and is the ethicist at the Caribbean Public Health Agency — CARPHA. (The views expressed here are not written on behalf of CARPHA)