Psychological Characteristics of Surgical Patients With Thyroid Disease

Abstract

The present study examined the psychological characteristics of surgical patients with Graves' diseases (GD) and papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) through the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and the Baum test before and after the surgery. In the pre-test [Study 1], the PTC group scored higher on "externallyoriented thinking" of the TAS-20 and drew less structured trees regarding the boundary, consistency, and inner differentiation, compared with the control group. In the post-test [Study 2], the mean score of "externally-oriented thinking" of the TAS-20 was lower, and the mean score of "difficulty identifying feelings" of the TAS-20 was higher than that of the pre-test, respectively. The trees drawn in the post-test were classified into following three clusters; "changed into a more stable structure", "changed into a more unstable structure", and "unchanged". We discussed that the genuine psychotherapy is needed for those who showed more fundamental psychological changes.

Alexithymia, Emotional Distress, and Perceived Quality of Life in Patients With Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis

“…In our study, we found an overall prevalence of frank or possible alexithymia in 89.2% of cases, supporting the hypothesis that patients with HT and controls (patients with thyroid diseases in general) may be affected by difficulty in identifying and describing feelings to a significant extent, thus focusing on external events rather than on inner experiences (Hasegawa et al, 2019). Mean BDI-II, HAM-A, and SF-36 scores revealed mild depression, severe anxiety, and lower mental HRQoL compared to the normative Italian samples.…”

“…Although autoimmune thyroid diseases are considered risk factors for both depression and anxiety ( Bauer et al, 2001 ; Grabe et al, 2005 ; Bell et al, 2007 ; Samuels, 2008 ; Bathla et al, 2016 ; Rieben et al, 2016 ), the relationship between autoimmune and non-autoimmune thyroid diseases and alexithymia has been poorly studied so far ( Ivanova and Gorobets, 2011 ; Le Donne et al, 2012 ; Hasegawa et al, 2019 ).…”

“…To the best of our knowledge, only three studies focused on the relationship between alexithymia and thyroid diseases, one of them including women in the postpartum setting ( Le Donne et al, 2012 ) and two studies including patients with autoimmune thyroid diseases ( Ivanova and Gorobets, 2011 ; Hasegawa et al, 2019 ). Particularly, Ivanova and Gorobets (2011) concluded that alexithymia is both a risk factor for HT development and a predictor of HT course.…”

Hormonal abnormalities in alexithymia

“…Hasegawa et al ( 46 ) examined TAS-20 alexithymia scores in surgical patients with thyroid disease (Graves’ disease and papillary thyroid cancer) before and after thyroidectomy surgery. After surgery, all patients scored significantly higher on the DIF factor of the TAS-20 alexithymia scale, compared to pre-surgically.…”