The Effectiveness of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy on Rumination and Fatigue in Patients with Cervical Cancer

Introduction and Aim:  Identifying the main psychological variables involved in the development ‎of uterine cancer and using effective and useful psychotherapy ‎approaches in the treatment of cancer diseases is necessary, so this study aimed to determine the effectiveness of ‎mindfulness-based cognitive therapy on rumination and fatigue in patients with cervical cancer.‎ Methods: This quasi-experimental study was conducted with a pretest-posttest design with a control group ‎and a follow-up period. The statistical population consisted of all female patients with cervical ‎cancer‏ ‏who were referred to Al-Zahra Medical Center in Isfahan in the first six months of 2021. Using ‎the convenience-sampling method, 30 patients were selected and allocated to experimental and ‎control groups (n1= n1=15), randomly. The research instruments included the rumination scale ‎‎(Nolen-Hooksma and Murrow, 1991) and cancer-induced fatigue (Okmiyama et al., 2000), which ‎were filled at pre-intervention, post-intervention, and follow-up by both groups. The intervention ‎group received Segal and Tizdel (2018) mindfulness cognitive therapy method during eight 90-‎minute sessions. Simultaneously, no intervention was considered for the control group. Data were ‎analyzed using repeated-measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) via SPSS software version 22 with a ‎significance level of 0.05‎‏.‏ Results: The results showed a significant difference in post-test between the experimental and control groups in the variables of rumination (p < 0.001) and fatigue due to cancer (p < 0.001). Conclusion: Based on the findings of this study, it can be said that mindfulness-based cognitive therapy was ‎effective in reducing rumination and fatigue in patients with cervical cancer and it can be used as ‎a complementary therapy along with cancer treatments.