Do cancer patients really want counseling?

Newly diagnosed cancer patients who were screened as being "at risk" for future psychosocial distress were offered a counseling program, covering the period from hospital discharge to resumption of regular activity. More than two-thirds of "at risk" patients accepted. Those who refused the program tended to be more antagonistic or apprehensive than those who accepted. Refusers denied difficulties, minimized problems, and in certain instances were truculent and suspicious. Some refusers did not wish to be interviewed, for fear that social and emotional equilibrium would be disturbed; they rejected counseling, which was felt to be either an immediate threat or an omen of disaster. Accepters, while as much "at risk," did not deny, but felt more hopeless. Differences in cancer site, stage, symptoms, treatment, availability of significant others, age, sex, social status, and so forth were not significant.