| dc.description.abstract | Background: To be diagnosed with cancer affects the whole person, both mentally and physically. The treatment may also affect the patient. Chemotherapy often has powerful side effects like fatigue, nausea and vomiting. It is important for the nurse to have knowledge about what might help the patients to cope with these side effects.
Aim: To learn more about cancer and coping with side effects of chemotherapy. To learn what the patient can do to cope with the side effects, and what the nurses can do to promote coping of these side effects for the cancer patients.
Method: Literature study, with a systematic review of relevant research and literature. Search for literature was done in CINAHL, SveMed+ and PubMed. Five articles were included in this thesis.
Results: There are both problem focused and emotion focused strategies for coping with the side effects fatigue, loss of hair, nausea and vomiting. Information is important for coping with side effects. For coping with nausea and vomiting, acupressure and counseling evidently have positive effect. Use of prescription drugs, nutrition counseling and other measures have also proven to be effective against nausea and vomiting. For coping with fatigue working out has a positive effect, but also measures like distraction and relaxation can help reduce fatigue and thereby contribute to coping. For loss of hair a lot of the nursing interventions involve helping the patient accept the hair loss which makes it easier to cope with. Some of the measures also involve helping the patient to find items that can cover up the changes caused by hair loss. | no_NO |
