Can Cancer Treatment Be "More Therapy And Less Medics" ?

While surgery, radiation, chemo therapy and hormone therapy are the most common methods of treating cancer patients, full time psychotherapy is the new go to. Though the classic talk therapy which forms the basis of Fruedian psychoanalogy can be a slow method, it shows a better recovery rate in the patients. Also, this is a harmless non-surgical method where the patient doesn't have to undergo severe side effects like hair loss, fatigue, flu, skin changes, mouth sores, etc and internal burns.

Multiple meta-analyses have been conducted evaluating the outcomes of studies that assessed some aspect of quality of life (QoL) among patients with cancer or survivors of cancer, and, overall, these studies showed that psychotherapy may have some benefit.

A more recent meta-analysis of 4 trials that evaluated adjunct psychotherapy demonstrated that it improved QoL and coping among patients with cancer, including decreased distress, anxiety, and depression.

A qualitative systematic review of pediatric cancer survivors and their families found that across 33 studies, psychosocial interventions generally provided benefit to patients and their families.5 Most  of the studies included in the analysis found that patients and/or their families experienced improvement in behavior or emotional problems, social skills, anxiety, and depression.

The quality of the trials, however, were deemed to be of poor quality and the authors concluded that the evidence is unsatisfactory and that more well-designed trials were required. Cochrane review of 30 randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of patients with newly diagnosed cancer found no effect of psychosocial interventions (defined as an interpersonal dialogue between the patient and a trained helper) on general QoL or psychological distress as measured by depression or anxiety at 6-month follow-up.

In these cases, we can opt for certain modern and more advanced techniques of psychotherapy like the placebo effect, Jeffrey Allen's energy healing or the law of attraction backed by spirituality and cosmology. Hope that in the coming years, the world will worship and understand the importance of mental wellness and psychotherapy.