The effect of personality type on self-ego and quality of life in patients with breast cancer and related factors

Introduction: Self-esteem is a way of coping with stress for cancer patients and this improves their quality of life. The effect of personality type on cancer development, prognosis and quality of life was also investigated. Objective: It was aimed to determine the relationship between type A personality trait and self-esteem and quality of life in women with breast cancer and to determine the effective factors. Methods and Materials: 154 women with breast cancer and 78 healthy women were included. Bortner's Rating scale, Rosenberg Self-Esteem scale and EORTC QOL-C30 scale were used. The relationship between the presence of hobbies, self-esteem, quality of life and personality type was examined. Mann-Whitney U, Kruskall-Wallis, Fisher's Exact, Spearman Rank correlation tests were performed. Independent factors affecting personality type, self-esteem and quality of life were determined by multivariate logistic (binary) regression analysis. The p<0.05 value was significant in the SPSS v19 program. Results: There was no age difference between the patients (54 ± 11 years) and the control group (42 ± 8 years) (p= 0.108). The rate of type A personality was 69% in patients and 58% in controls (p= 0.093). Similarly, the rate of high self-esteem was 93% in patients and 96% in controls (p=0.098). Besides personality type and self-esteem, there was no relationship between personality type and quality of life in cancer patients (p=0.960 and p=0.946, respectively). A relationship was established between self-esteem and quality of life (p=0.018) in patients. In patients with type A personality, hobbies providing social active communication were common (p=0.039) and had more than two hobbies (p=0.015). Hobby preference and number of hobbies had independent effects on self-esteem (p=0.032, p=0.041), quality of life (respectively, p=0.004, p=0.007), and personality type (respectively, p=0.014, p=0.027). Conclusion: Hobbies that provide active social communication may have important effects on changes in personality traits, self-esteem and quality of life in women with cancer. Keywords: Breast cancer, personality type, self-esteem, quality of life, hobby