Objective: The purpose of the study was to examine associations between self-esteem and symptoms of anxiety and depression among young adults who lost a parent to cancer.

Methods: Older adolescents and young adults, aged 16 to 28 years, who had lost their parent to cancer and had accepted an invitation to join a support group, completed a questionnaire 5 to 8 months after the loss and a similar questionnaire about 10 months later (follow-up). Of a total of 77 young adults who participated in the study, 56 completed both questionnaires. Self-esteem was measured with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. Symptoms of anxiety and depression were measured with the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Univariate and multiple linear regression models were used to analyze the associations.

Result: Self-esteem was significantly associated with symptoms of anxiety and depression at baseline and at follow-up.

Conclusion: This study reveals that self-esteem is a valuable explanatory variable, and that it is associated with both symptoms of anxiety and depression in bereavement. This new knowledge could be used to guide future support to parentally bereaved young adults.

The aim of this study was to illuminate the way of being a family when one family member is in the midst of living and dying. A family systems frame and a life world perspective were used in interviews with five families. A qualitative analysis inspired by Giorgi revealed dialectic and dynamic processes in constant motion within and between the continua being in affinity-being in loneliness, being in power-being in helplessness, and being in continuity-being in disruption. When families were moving in the direction of being in affinity, power, and continuity, these seemed to be prerequisites for enduring their challenged life situation and for giving them a kind of repose. When the movements were in the opposite direction, existential and emotional suffering were manifested as individual embodied experiences such as depression and anxiety.

Objectives: To gain a deeper understanding of surgical nurses’ experiences of existential issues in cancer care.

Methods: Written critical incidents were used to collect nurses’ descriptions and reflections of critical care situations involving existential issues. Individual face-to-face interviews were conducted as follow-up using semi-structured questions which were analysed with hermeneutical analysis.

Preliminary results: The analysis showed that nurses in surgical care experience caring from different positions. Nurses either focus on the patient as a whole in the caring process or nurses focus more on medical information in the caring process. When focusing on the patient as a whole existential issues are considered to be a natural part of the caring process and nurses’ personal experiences help to enable encounters with the patients. When focusing more on the medical information in the caring process there was a transfer of responsibility to others, mainly the physicians.

Preliminary conclusions: This study highlights that existential issues are indeed part of surgical cancer care derived from existential care situations. Nurses’ focus in the caring process differs. Nurses express different positions in caring and not all acknowledge patients’ existential issues as part of nurses’ responsibility. When lacking common strategies in the organization nurses derive existential caring strategies from personal experiences.