Impact of Rural-Urban Differences in Acceptance and Meaning of Life among Breast Cancer Patients in India

Abstract

India is a land of unity in diversity and it is not only true about its sociocultural but also holds residential areas too. Rural and urban areas associated with different sociostructural characteristics may contribute variation in behavioural adaptation. We studied the impact of rural-urban differences on the acceptance level and meaning of life among breast cancer patients in India. The present analytical descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted under superspecialty hospital, West Bengal, India. We compared the acceptance capability and meaning in life in breast cancer patients from rural areas (N = 122) and urban areas (N = 99). Patient-reported data concerning selected psychological (acceptance ability and the meaning of life), sociodemographic, and biological factors were collected by using validated tools. To identify the impact of sociocultural variation, descriptive statistics were calculated as the mean ± standard deviation of the score of validated tools based on acceptance and meaning of life. Patients from urban areas perceived meaning of life significantly worse than rural individuals (33.1 ± 2.44 vs. 24.2 ± 1.02). Education ( $p=<0.01$ ), family per capita income ( $p=0<0.01$ ), and family structure ( $p=0.004$ ) factors were evaluated for being predictors of acceptance levels, whereas the educational level ( $p=<0.01$ ) has significantly interacted with the meaning of life among both areas’ patients. Disease acceptance levels were found to be significantly higher in urban area’s patients than rural ones (38.6 ± 1.9 vs. 32.7 ± 1.92). The current study demonstrates that the patients of rural background and low education are more likely than their respective counterparts to have a lower level of acceptance capability and meaning of life.