佐藤, まゆみ

泰圓澄, 洋子

眞嶋, 朋子

Sato, Mayumi

Taiencho, Yoko

Majima, Tomoko

gynecological cancer

younger patient

experience

The purposes of this study were to clarify the experiences of younger patients following gynecological cancer surgery in their relationships with others during their first postoperative year. Subjects were 9 patients in their 20s and 30s who had undergone surgery for gynecological cancer. Dates were collected through semi-structured interviews and participant observation. As a result of qualitative inductive analysis, the experiences of younger patients were categorized into 18 experiences, including "guessing their husbands' and parents' expectations of children and blaming ourselves for not being able to give birth to children", "mental fatigue from the excessive shows of concern after surgery by family and friends", "concern about restarting their sex lives", "anguish of realizing that their partners had lost interest in them sexually", "sensing that others were biased against us as women without a uterus or ovaries", "hiding the fact that they had uterine or ovarian cancer in their relationships with others", "being overcome by fear following the deaths of patients with the same kind of cancer", "realizing that existence of partners was irreplaceable through affections of them", "strengthened bonds with family while looking toward the future", "finding meaning in their lives by helping others", Nursing care for younger gynecological cancer patients to support to get over the difficulty in their relationships with others were considered to be the following: 1) encourage patients to accept the loss of their uterus or ovaries and loss of fertility and support patients in reestablishing their self-image, 2) help patients to maintain a natural sex life; 3) coordinate ties between the patients and their partners, family or society to bring out the strength to get over the distress ; and 4) help patients to return to social life.