ATTITUDES TOWARD INFORMING THE CANCER-PATIENT - A SURVEY OF NORWEGIANPHYSICIANS

To examine Norwegian physicians) attitudes to informing patients of a diagnosis of cancer, a random sample of 1467 were surveyed. The respon dents rated their level of agreement to 14 statements, and the respons es were analysed by chi-squared statistics. 990 physicians responded ( 67%). Only 30.5% of the responding physicians had treated more than 10 cancer patients the previous year, which included 7.8% who had treate d more than 50, 40.4% had treated none. The great majority (81%) prefe rred full information of the diagnosis. Physicians with increasing age preferred relatives not being present and gave priority to factual in formation and informing patients with the same diagnosis identically. Hospital physicians (39.5%) more often preferred other health professi onals being present than physicians in private practice (18%) (P < 0.0 01). Number of cancer patients treated was not associated with attitud es toward the disclosure of information. Norwegian physicians prefer r evealing the cancer diagnosis to patients, but have divergent opinions about how to do so. Some of these indicate suboptimal information-giv ing. Copyright (C) 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd