@article{ref1,
title="Exposure to suicidality in professionals working with oncology patients: an online survey",
journal="Psycho-oncology",
year="2020",
author="Senf, Bianca and Maiwurm, Paula and Fettel, Jens",
volume="ePub",
number="ePub",
pages="ePub-ePub",
abstract="OBJECTIVE: To explore and describe exposure to suicidality in healthcare providers (HPC) working with oncological patients. Special emphasis was put on five central aspects from the HPCs perspective: Exposure, Confidence, Expertise, Distress, and Education.   METHODS: A 48-item online questionnaire was developed and distributed to HPCs working with cancer patients. Three hundred fifty-four answered questionnaires were analyzed.   RESULTS: Overall 83.3% of HPCs reported to have encountered at least one suicidal patient in the last year. Feeling confident in talking about suicidality was reported by 72.1% of HPCs, with 71.2% of nurses reporting feeling insecure compared with only 5.1% of psychotherapists. Similarly, 22.3% of HPCs felt overwhelmed when confronted with a patient who substantiated his suicidality during consultation. A lack of personal knowledge concerning suicidality in general and in oncological patients in particular, was reported by 39.6% and 49.8%, respectively. In total, 88.1% of HPCs reported feeling distressed when confronted with suicidality, while 81.1% of participants wanted further education regarding suicidality in cancer patients despite that 73.2% had already received some sort of psycho-oncology education.   CONCLUSIONS: Despite the well-documented fact of elevated suicide rates in cancer patients, there remain deficits in knowledge, which induce feelings of insecurity and helplessness in HPCs. There is a demand for further education concerning the treatment of suicidal cancer patients. Therefore, special curricula addressing this topic should be devised. A general debate about suicidality in cancer patients could help raise awareness of this problem and generate means of prevention. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1057-9249",
doi="10.1002/pon.5479",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pon.5479"
}