Influencing Factors of Death Fear in Terminal Cancer Patients

本研究於民國90年3月到10月期間，以台大醫院緩和醫療病房住院病人爲調查 對象，分別從事有關死亡恐懼程度和臨床宗教師的服務調查，共收集174名病人的資 料，依據同一病人調查三次，分別為住院時174名、住院後一週100名、死亡前二天 122名。分析死亡恐懼程度與性別、年齡和宗教師接觸的相關因素結果如下：病患接 受緩和醫療照顧，死亡恐懼程度隨住院時間及生命的結束而降低。死亡恐懼指數的降 低在有無宗教師接觸的情況比較時，發現住院時和住院一週，並無差異，但是在往生 前二天，有接觸法師組死亡恐懼指數比沒接觸組顯著降低。往生前死亡恐懼指數的降 低與宗教師接觸時間長短有關。老年人與非老年人比較，往生前二天，老年人的死亡 恐懼顯著高於非老年人，而死亡恐懼的指數與男女性別在住院期間三次調查之間沒有 相關。 The study was conducted at a palliative care unit of medical center from March to Oct 2001. Using death fear scale, each patient was investigated three occasions, i .e. on admission, one week after admission and 2 days before death, during life time. There were 174, 100 and 122 patients for above each respective occasion. The influencing factors of death fear including gender, age and religiosity were analyzed. The results were shown as follows: (1) Along with team work palliative care, the severity of death fear has been decreasing till death. (2) There was a significant lower death fear severity for patients receiving clinical Buddhist chaplain care 2 days before death, especially contact time longer than 15 minutes. (3) The elderly patients had higher death fear 2 days before death. (4) There was no difference of death fear between genders.