Sleep Quality Before and After Surveillance Mammograms in Breast Cancer Survivors: Fear of Cancer Recurrence Predicts Longitudinal Change in Sleep Quality

Sleep problems are common among cancer survivors and are related to poorer overall quality of life. This study evaluated sleep quality during the week before and the week after breast cancer survivors completed scheduled surveillance mammography, a typically stressful period in the survivorship phase. Several studies have demonstrated that fear of cancer recurrence (FCR) is related to poorer quality of life, but few have focused on sleep quality. We hypothesized that sleep quality and FCR would improve following receipt of negative mammogram results. We also hypothesized that sleep quality would be related to FCR both before and after the mammogram, and that greater FCR would predict lower sleep quality. Participants were 136 stage 0-IIIA breast cancer survivors who had completed treatment between 6 and 36 months previously. Participants completed the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) and modified Cancer Worry Scale (CWS) in clinic immediately before (T1) and 1 week after their surveillance mammogram (T2). As predicted, sleep quality as measured by the PSQI improved from T1 (M = 5.95, SD = 3.73) to T2 (M = 5.29, SD = 3.66), p