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

Summary 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 non-intervention 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.