Effectiveness of Cognitive-Existential Group Therapy on Life Expectancy and Anxiety of Adolescent with Cancer

Introduction: People with cancer especially adolescent, is experiencing some troubles such as anxiety, depression, and unhappiness. This study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of Cognitive-existential group therapy on life Expectancy and the anxiety of cancer diagnosed adolescent. Methods: The Research method was quasi-experimental with pretest-posttest. This study population consisted of all positive cancer diagnosed female adolescent located in Tehran in 2018, among whom thirty people were selected by purposeful sampling and considering the entry criteria, divided into two fifteen members groups. the experimental group received eight sessions of cognitive-existential group therapy and the control group had received no intervention. Life expectancy of Miller and the Beck anxiety inventory used as study tools. Descriptive statistics and univariate analysis of covariance were used to analyze the data through SPSS20. Results: The results of posttest indicate a significant difference between the mean scores of life expectancy F=39.25, Sig=0.000 and the anxiety F=11.6, Sig=0.002 of an adolescent in the experiment group in comparison to control group. Conclusions: The cognitive-existential group therapy could increase life expectancy and could reduce the anxiety of cancer diagnosed adolescent. So this treatment can be used to improve the anxiety and to increase the life expectancy of cancer diagnosed adolescent.