Difficulty in continuing job for breast cancer patients getting chemotherapy

Introduction
The breast cancer treatment accompanies physical pain due to the side effects of chemotherapy. The average age of breast cancer incidence in Japan is a productive age of latter half of 40s, and there are a lot of patients dealing with work while getting outpatient treatment. The purpose of this study is to clarify difficulties of continuing work while getting outpatient treatments for breast cancer patients.

Methods
Target: Six breast cancer patients continue working and getting chemotherapy were selected. Data collection: The semi-structured interview regarding “Difficulty in continuing jobs” was conducted to the patients. Analysis method: The categorization was performed on the interview contents to extract words related to “Difficulty in continuing jobs”. Ethical consideration: This study was approved by the ethical committee of Hiroshima International University.

Results
“Difficulty in continuing both chemotherapy and jobs” consisted of seven categories: (1) “Physical pain associated with side effects of treatment”, (2) “Apologetic feeling of absence at work”, (3) “Save one's energy to work by the fear of reoccurrence”, (4) “Lack of care at workplace ”, (5) “Inconvenience of hospital systems”, (6) “Fear of decrease in job ability from side effects of treatment” and (7) “Painful feeling about colleague’s care after announcing disease”.

Discussion
From the categories (1), (2) and (3), patients had feelings not to work very hard because of their physical pains and fear of reoccurrence. So, it suggests a need for creation the new system of holiday. Furthermore from the category (7), it is necessary to know the feeling of patients who get hurt when realizing severity of their disease. It is necessary for a health nurse working at an industrial site to support patients carefully to understand their physical pains and feelings to continue chemotherapy and work.