Abstract:
The research was a descriptive and correlational study with the objective of exploring anxiety about death in cancer persons and the relationships between age, gender, disease stage, cancer type, family relationships, Buddhist religious beliefs about death, self-efficacy, unfinished business, symptom severity, and death anxiety in cancer persons. The sample group included cancer persons at all stages and types aged 18 and above, who received treatment at the outpatient cancer department of two tertiary hospitals in Bangkok, totaling 181 individuals. The research tools used included personal information questionnaires, death anxiety questionnaires, family relationship assessments, unfinished business questionnaires, Buddhist religious beliefs about death questionnaires, self-efficacy questionnaires, and symptom severity assessments. These tools demonstrated good quality in terms of the content validity and reliability. Data were analyzed using Descriptive, Pearson correlation and Eta statistics.The research findings revealed that the sample group of cancer persons exhibited high levels of anxiety about death, with an average score of 46.11 (SD = 10.80). Factors significantly positively correlated with death anxiety included disease stage, unfinished business, symptom severity, and cancer type (r= .77, r= .86, r= .55; Eta= .34, p < .05, respectively). Factors significantly negatively correlated with death anxiety included family relationships, Buddhist religious beliefs about death, and self-efficacy (r= -.80, r= -.59, and r= -.34, p < .05, respectively). Age and gender showed no significant correlation with death anxiety.