Effectiveness of psychological interventions intended to promote adjustment of children with cancer and their parents: an overview (original) (raw)

2014, Anales de Psicología, 2014, vol. 30 (1), 93-103

Abstract: This article aims at providing a general overview of psychologi-cal interventions intended to promote psychological adjustment of children with cancer and their parents. To achieve this goal, we reviewed published articles between 1998-2010, using a combination of the following key-words: psychosocial intervention, psychotherapy, trial, treatment, adjust-ment, well-being, adaptation, cancer, childhood cancer, pediatric cancer, anxiety and depression in the electronic databases: Psycinfo, Medline, Sci-elo, Lilacs, Psicodoc and Psyarticles. Fourteen articles were found and analyses show that most interventions had some efficacy in the psychologi-cal adjustment of children and their parents; nevertheless, there is a limited number of treatments that can in fact be considered effective. The conven-ience of psychological interventions is discussed and how they must com-prehend strengths and the promotion of psychological health and should not be based solely on deficits and psychopathological models. Possibly, this re-orientation will help fostering significant clinic changes regarding the stress associated to cancer and its treatment. Key words: Psychological adjustment; psychological interventions; child-hood cancer; overview.