Impact of Meditation on Pain in Cancer Patients

The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of meditation on the perceived pain intensity of cancer patients. It was felt that such a study would assist in providing physicians and other medical care providers with a more empirical look at alternative treatments for cancer pain and that, as a result, they and other medical care personnel would be more inclined to use these alterative treatments for pain patients in general and cancer pain patients in particular.

The conducted study tested the hypothesis that the level of pain intensity subjects were perceiving at present (as measured by PPI scores on the short form of the McGill Pain Questionnaire) would be significantly reduced following their practice of a mindfulness meditation technique that was taught to them by the researcher.

All subjects (N = 15) in the study were female patients who were drawn from the female population of the Oncology Ward at Montefiore Hospital. All subjects volunteered to be in the study after having it explained to them and signing an informed consent form.

The study used a pre-experimental, one-group, pretest-posttest design in which subjects were first assessed for their present level of perceived pain intensity using the short form of the McGill Pain Questionnaire. They were then taught the mindfulness meditation technique, and asked to practice it for 30 minutes. Three hours later they were assessed again for their present level of perc

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za, Sellick, Willan, Reyno and Browman (1999) report that: Many studies have confirmed unnecessary suffering among cancer patients, due to the inadequate use of analgesic medication and other effective interventions. While pharmacological treatments are appropriately the central component of cancer pain management, the under-utilization of effective nonpharmacological strategies...may contribute to the problem of pain and suffering among cancer patients. (p. 99). The purpose of this study was to examine the use of meditation as a nonpharmacological treatment for can pain management. It is hoped that positive findings for the technique will assist in fostering more utilization of this as well as other alternative forms of pain management in oncology wards. Significance of the Study Schimpff (1997) refers to alternative, non-pharmacological treatments for pain as "complementary medicine," noting that, in general, complementary medicine consists of approaches to care outside of mainstream medical practice that are commonly based on traditional practices of nonwestern cultures. Examples of complementary medicine can be said to include massage, diet, manipulation, acupuncture and meditation. According to Schimpff (1997), the lit

Category: Medical - I