Investigation and correlation analysis of fear of cancer recurrence and social support after thyroid cancer surgery

OBJECTIVE: This study investigated the association between fear of cancer recurrence and the level of social support among individuals who have undergone thyroid cancer surgery. PATIENTS AND METHODS: The study was conducted at our hospital from May 2021 to June 2022 and involved the distribution of 520 questionnaires to postoperative thyroid cancer patients using stratified random sampling. A high response rate of 97.11% was achieved, with 505 completed questionnaires returned. The survey employed a specially designed three-dimensional scale, encompassing aspects of social support (A1-A7), fear of relapse (B1-B7), and disease awareness (C1-C6). This, coupled with patients' medical records and pathological data, formed a comprehensive basis for analysis. RESULTS: Key findings revealed significant variations in social support, disease awareness, and fear of recurrence across different clinical stages of the patients (p <0.05). The analysis demonstrated that social support exhibited a moderate positive correlation with disease cognition (r=0.602, p <0.001). Conversely, fear of recurrence displayed a mild negative correlation with both social support (r= -0.413, p <0.001) and disease cognition (r= -0.396, p <0.001). Logistic regression identified several independent factors influencing the fear of recurrence, including distant metastasis, clinical stage, risk level, social support, and disease cognition (p <0.005). CONCLUSIONS: The fear of cancer recurrence in patients’ post-thyroid cancer surgery is inversely related to the degree of social support they receive, thus highlighting the importance of social support as a significant determinant in managing the fear of cancer recurrence.