Mental health literacy in Japanese cancer patients: ability to recognize depression and preferences of treatments-comparison with Japanese lay public.
BACKGROUND
Insufficient knowledge about mental illness and its treatment has been shown to constitute a major barrier to its adequate care for mental illness in the lay public (LP). We therefore examined Japanese cancer patients' (CP) ability to recognize depression and their preferences of its treatments.


METHODS
One hundred lung CP and 300 LP were selected at random to participate in the study. Structured interviews using a vignette of a person with both cancer and depression were conducted with CP, and those using a vignette of a person with depression were carried out with LP, respectively.


RESULTS
Only 11% of CP recognized the presence of depression in the vignette, while 25% of LP did (p<0.001). There were few significant differences in the preference for standard psychiatric treatments between CP and LP: standard treatments such as antidepressants (CP: 39%, LP: 36%) were less often rated as helpful, whereas non-standard treatments such as physical activity (CP: 85%, LP: 66%) were most often rated as helpful.


CONCLUSIONS
The results indicated that cancer patients' knowledge about mental illness and its treatment were insufficient. Psychological education may reduce patient-related barriers to seek and to utilize optimal mental health care in cancer patients.
Okuyama
Toru
T
Department of Psychiatry and Cognitive-behavioral Medicine, Nagoya City University Graduate School of Medical Sciences, Japan. okuyama@med.nagoya-cu.ac.jp
Nakane
Yoshibumi
Y
Endo
Chiharu
C
Seto
Takashi
T
Kato
Masashi
M
Seki
Nobuhiko
N
Akechi
Tatsuo
T
Furukawa
Toshiaki A
TA
Eguchi
Kenji
K
Hosaka
Takashi
T
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D044466:Asian People; D001294:Attitude to Health; D002755:Choice Behavior; D003710:Demography; D003865:Major Depressive Disorder / Q000209:etiology* / Q000628:therapy*; D004522:Educational Status; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000523:psychology*; D021641:Recognition, Psychology