Depression and Anxiety in Women with a Mastectomy

Abstract

This paper is part of a research project entitled " Application of the Counseling and Therapy Model of Emotional Support in the Mastectomy Patient," executed by the Clinical and Mental Health Group in the Psychology Department of the UCPR. The article seeks to show, from a conceptual perspective, that mastectomy affects the psychological state of cancer patients. After breast removal, women are faced with loss, and the challenge of incorporating these changes and to adapt to them in their daily lives is not always met. On the contrary, the loss often produces emotional disorders, which start taking place even at the diagnosis stage before the surgery. Once patients are aware of the changes in their body, such disorders may also deepen in the form of depression and/or anxiety that go beyond adaptive reactions