Historical-Clinical Pathways to a Cancer Holistic Perspective

Abstract

A historical reconstruction of the holistic approach to cancer is presented. A particular attention is given to the United States, since, after reductionism had prevailed in Western world, New York Jungian psychoanalyst Elida Evans published the first modern monograph about the psychology of cancer patients in 1926, proposing a holistic view of cancer again. Evans' theory has largely influenced cancer psychosomatics. Without pretension of completeness, research on cancer is discussed in its epidemiological, social, environmental, behavioural, and psychoanalytical aspects. The results of psychoneuroimmunology and the discoveries of developmental psychobiology are highlighted for their importance in a holistic vision of cancer. Assumption of this paper is that persistent dualism -studying body or mind -is depriving research of fundamental variables involved in human cancer; therefore, integrated multidisciplinary investigation is advocated.