CDI Scientist Creates Program to Alleviate "Scanxiety" in Lung Cancer Patients

Heather Derry-Vick, Ph.D., tailors a stress management program to combat stress and improve quality of life in advanced cancer patients undergoing repeated scan procedures

“Scanxiety,” or scan-associated anxiety, is a phenomenon informally known in the medical community—and specifically in oncology—as the acute feeling of distress experienced by patients before, during, and after undergoing scan procedures to diagnose or monitor cancer across the full trajectory of screening and treatment.

For people with advanced cancer, such distress is experienced routinely and chronically, which can negatively impact their quality of life, sleep, concentration, and other outcomes.

As a health psychologist and researcher at the Hackensack Meridian Center for Discovery and Innovation (CDI), Heather Derry-Vick, Ph.D., works to meet these patients where their physical and mental health intersect.

Through this mission, Dr. Derry-Vick and her team conducted a series of studies and projects, publishing their work in the scientific journal, Psycho-Oncology. The research team applied Dr. Derry-Vick’s psychosocial expertise in anxiety and stress management into a program specifically designed to alleviate scanxiety in patients living with advanced lung cancer.

“We used input from patients with Stage IV lung cancer to tailor evidence-based coping exercises to be most useful and appropriate around the stressful time of routine cancer scans,” said Dr. Derry-Vick. “Patients’ preferences about which strategies seemed useful, and their feedback on early versions of the content, really helped shape the program.”

The program includes a website that aims to alleviate acute symptoms of anxiety that patients often experience around the time of their cancer scans. Scanxiety can lead to trouble sleeping or concentrating, and enhanced irritability or tension.

“Obtaining input from patients, family members, and clinicians was critical to our process ,” said Dr. Derry-Vick. “The website includes educational information and ways to practice different skills for managing stress. Most participants found the program highly acceptable and easy to use, and gave us ideas for making it even more useful, which helped us refine it.”

It was concluded that the program—guided in this study by patients, family members, and clinicians as stakeholders—could potentially be helpful in reducing scanxiety and showed innovation potential for improving the patient experience of living with cancer. The next step is pilot testing the program, with larger trials to come testing its impact on scanxiety.

“I’m so thankful for the team effort in this study,” said Dr. Derry-Vick. “What’s most important is the program’s potential to maximize quality of life for patients with advanced lung cancer going through such stressful times that, to this point, are under-addressed in the context of their care.”

Dr. Derry-Vick is available for interviews into this study and the foundation process of her program. Please reach out to CDI Marketing and Communications Manager Seth Augenstein at seth.augenstein@hmhn.org with any interest in covering this psychosocial innovation in oncological patient care.