<Journal> </Journal>

<ArticleTitle>Social Support in Cancer Patients Referring to Sayed Al-Shohada Hospital</ArticleTitle>

<FirstPage>641</FirstPage>

<LastPage>641</LastPage>

<Language>EN</Language>

<AuthorList> </AuthorList>

<History></History>

<Abstract>Background: Cancer diagnosis is an important event in individual&rsquo;s life which follows considerable outcomes and implications for patient and his/her family. Meanwhile, receiving assist and support from family and friends has a significant impact to help patient to cope with disease-related stress and its treatment. This study aimed to review the amount of received social support and its correlation with demographic and medical variables in order to facilitate care and support from health-care professionals particularly nurses through obtaining more information about the related causes to higher social support. Methods and Materials: This was cross-sectional descriptive study on two hundreds cancer patients referring to Sayed Al-Shohada Medical Center in Isfahan. The study subjects were selected through convenient sampling method and required information collected by questionnaire containing demographic and medical data and Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support. Some of the inclusion criteria included age of over 18 and no history of mental disorders and not being at final stages of disease. Content validity of Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support confirmed through survey from experts and its reliability by re-test (r &gt; 0.85). The data of the questionnaires completed and analyzed through Software SPSS with frequency distribution and chi-square test. Results: The results showed that the majority of cancer patients (94.5%) perceived a high rate of social support from their families, friends and relatives. Furthermore, the findings indicated a statistical significant correlation between the number of children with social support; however, no significant correlation was found between other demographic and medical variables with social support. Conclusion: The findings of the study indicated receiving the maximum acceptable social support from family, especially children, in patients with cancer which were in accordance with results of other researcher in different countries. However, conducting further extensive studies is recommended to review effective factors on social support of patients with cancer. Keywords: Social support; Cancer patients</Abstract>