Comparison the Meaning of Life among Cancer Patients and their Family Members in Tabriz Hospitals, 2010.

Abstract

Abstract: Cancer affects human beings of every race, color, cultural, educational, and economical background. The present study was undertaken to investigate the meaning of life from view point of people afflicted with different cancer and their family members. The present study is of a descriptive-compparative kind, and has been undertaken to investigate the meaning of life for 200 patients afflicted with various cancers who were referred to the selected hospitals of the Tabriz Universities of Medical Sciences, and their 200 family members through available sampling procedure. tools utilized were the life evaluation Questionnaire (LEQ) of simon et al (1996) and demographic information form of the people sampled. the data was analayzed through utilization of Komogorov-smirnov test, independent T test, and ANOVA, and was finally interpreted by using SPSS20 software. forty five persent of the patients and their family members(total of 400 people) who participated in the present study were male. The mean age if patients was 44.73±13.9 years. The score obtained for meaning of life for men and women comprising patients family members and the patients themselves were statistically significant. Furthermore, the mean score for meaning of life for women was lower than the same for men(p<0.05). the means of the meaning of life for both groups(patients and their family members) have a difference of 27.22 at 0.05 significance. Finally it can be concluded that the mean score obtained for meaning of life for the cancer patients is lower than the same for their family members. Furthermore gender, economic status, and marital status affect the mean score of meaning life for family members of the cancer patients, while gender and economic status of family affect the score of meaning of life for the cancer patients.