A Study on Health Behavior Experience of the Cancer Patients

암 환자의 건강행위 이행경험에 관한 연구

The purpose of this study is to grasp the nature of health behavior to pactice in order to keep and improve the optimal health in the current status of the cancer patients. The subjects were 21 cancer patients, who knew about their disease for themselves, could communicate without mental disease history, and could understand the purpose of this study and cooperate, in a university hospital in Seoul. The data were collected by direct interview from July 15 to Oct. 17, 1994. The interview took about 1~2hours per one time for each paitent by unstructural and open questions. And they were classified into some similar contents on the basis of the phenomenological analysis and categorized. The analyzed results are as follows: 1) In the daily life before and after diagnosis as cancer patients, they were categorized into 6 areas-the state of movement, sleeping, nutrition and diet, society and economy, drinking and somking, and recognition of their health. 2) In the experience of health behavior of cancer patents, they were categorized into 7 areas-the state of movement, sleeping, nutrition and diet, society and economy, drinking and smoking, recognition of their health, and psychology etc. According to the analyzed results of daily life before diagnosis as cancer patients, it turned out that they didn't recognize the problems for their health habit and made their disease state bad by irresolute characteristics which hesitated to practice rightly, renunciation, and irresponsibility and so on, even if they had much interests in their health and were motivated. Therefore, it is necessary to recognize and have an individual-centric interests in order to change the pattern of life for optimal health state to some extent. In the health behavior of cancer patients, it turned out that they had interests in the state of nutrition and diet the most. Even though they experienced the change of serious nutritive state due to the bad gastroenteric trouble by anticancer treatment, they were trying to have a regular eating habit refraining from irritant food and use folk remedies or healthy food temperating the taste food thoroughly, they also showed the sensitive response for nutrition. In addition, they appeared to use the traditional medical treatment or the folk remedies very seriously without abuse. In consideration of it, it is desirable to use them together with the modern medical treatment intercomplementarily and necessary to look into the types for cancer patients and their benefits.