Vicissitudes of Death Anxiety During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

The author, an experienced psycho-oncologist, offers clinical insights that consider the importance of death anxiety in psychodynamic psychotherapy treatments during the COVID-19 pandemic. He reviews the contributions of Ernst Becker, Wilfred Bion and Sheldon Solomon, and formulates ideas of his own based on decades of experience treating patients with cancer. This short essay focuses on how to help patients during the COVID-19 pandemic work through fear and uncertainty while developing adaptive skills.

The Treatment of Cancer Patients Who Die.

The psychodynamic treatment of dying cancer patients is a relatively neglected area in practice and the literature. Death anxiety in these patients often results in countertransferences that lead therapists to exclude dying patients for treatment or avoid discussing their patients' concerns about dying. This article offers the reader an exposure to a clinician's immersion in the psychodynamic treatment of cancer patients for over 40 years and offers recommendations that meet the needs of patients facing death.

Psychodynamic Psychiatry for Patients with Cancer: Survivorship.

The psychodynamic treatment approach for patients newly diagnosed with cancer provides a uniquely effective model for understanding the onset of psychiatric symptoms and planning a psychotherapeutic intervention. The words "you have cancer" often disrupt the patient's usual customary defenses and can result in the onset of psychiatric symptoms. The psychiatric symptoms will depend on the patient's usual defenses, past history, and characteristic style of relating to others.

Psychodynamic psychotherapy for cancer patients.

Psychodynamic psychotherapy is effective as an approach to understanding the psychological conflicts and the psychiatric symptoms of cancer patients as well as to planning useful psychological interventions. The author recommends that the psychotherapist who treats cancer patients be familiar with the following: 1) the natural course and treatment of the illness, 2) a flexible approach in accord with the medical status of the patient, 3) a common sense approach to defenses, 4) a concern with quality-of-life issues, and 5) counter-transference issues as they relate to the treatment of very sick patients. Case reports illustrate the unique problems facing psychotherapists who are treating cancer patients.