Efficacy of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) on Anxiety, Stress, and Marital Satisfaction in Married People with Breast Cancer

The present study aimed to investigate the impact of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) on depression, pain acceptance, and psychological flexibility in married people with breast cancer. The present study was a pre and post-test clinical trial with intervention and control groups. The research population consisted of people with breast cancer referred to Ayatollah Yasrebi and Shahid Beheshti Hospital in Kashan in 2018. Using the purposive sampling method 40 ones were selected and randomly divided into experimental (n = 20) and control (n = 20) groups. The instruments used in this study were Lovibond & Lovibond Depression. Anxiety. Stress scales-21 (DASS-21) and Olson marital satisfaction (Enrich). The results showed that ACT treatment significantly reduced the mean scores of anxiety (F = 31.30, P <0.001) and stress (F =37.06, P <0.001) compared to the control group. The mean scores of marital satisfaction (F= 24.92, P <0.05) significantly increased in comparison with the control group. ACT can be considered as an effective therapeutic approach to reduce anxiety and stress, and increase marital satisfaction in patients with breast cancer.