'Someone who cares': A qualitative investigation of cancer patients' experiences of psychotherapy

Although psychotherapy for cancer patients is known to be effective, there is little in the research to indicate what elements of their therapy patien ts find most helpful. To explore this question, we interviewed cancer patie nts diagnosed with metastatic disease who had been offered two different fo rms of individual psychotherapy as part of a larger funded study. These int erviews were then transcribed and analysed using grounded theory. Our aim w as to explore patients' psychotherapy experience from their perspective and to determine what common elements in the two approaches they felt were of greatest benefit. Results indicated that patients offered cognitive behavio ural therapy had similar experiences to those who received a type of relaxa tion therapy that included time for non-specific, patient-centred 'chat'. C entral to participants' experiences was the opportunity both therapies gave them to enter a relationship in which they could safely share their though ts and feelings with someone who seemed genuinely interested in understandi ng their cancer experience and 'truly cared'. These findings suggest that t he unique perspectives of cancer patients can add considerably to our under standing of individual psychotherapy in cancer care settings and how this m ight be improved. Copyright (C) 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.