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Meeting Psychosocial Needs of Women with Breast Cancer (IOM and NRC, 2004)
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Research sponsors (e.g., NCI, ACS) and professional organizations (e.g., American Society of Clinical Oncology, American College of Surgeons, American Association of Colleges of Nursing, American Psychosocial Oncology Society, American Society of Social Work, American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology, Oncology Nursing Society) need to support efforts in collaboration with advocacy groups (e.g., National Breast Cancer Coalition, National Alliance of Breast Cancer Organizations) to enhance practice environments to promote coordinated, comprehensive, and compassionate care.
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Research sponsors (e.g., NCI, ACS) should continue to support basic and applied psycho-oncology research. This might include:
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Further development of simple, rapid screening tools for identifying the patient with distress in outpatient offices and training of primary oncology teams in diagnosis of distress that exceeds the “expected” and when referral to supportive services should be made;
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Studies that assess the relative effectiveness of various psychosocial interventions, using population-based patient samples of adequate size, the timing and duration of intervention, and innovative and inexpensive modes of administration (e.g., Internet-based approaches);
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A consensus conference to develop a battery of standard instruments for outcome measures to permit comparison of data from studies carried out by different research groups;
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