BMJ 2001;323:1055-1058 ( 3 November )

Education and debate

Effect of sex and gender on psychosocial aspects of prostate and breast cancer

Alexander Kiss, psycho-oncologist ^a, Siegfried Meryn, general internist ^b. 

^a Psychosomatic Division, Department of Internal Medicine, University Clinics Basel, Petersgraben 4, CH-4031 Basel, Switzerland, ^b Centre for Advanced Medical Education and Health Communication, Medical Faculty of the University of Vienna, Borschkegasse 8B, A-1097 Vienna, Austria

Correspondence to: A Kiss akiss@uhbs.ch

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Being male or female is an important basic human variable that affects health and illness throughout life.¹ Men and women differ not only with regard to their reproductive organs and bodies but also in the way they think, feel, and behave. The physical difference is called sex, influenced by genes and biology; the psychological difference is called gender, in which environmental, cultural, and psychosocial factors also have a prominent role. Researchers are just beginning to unravel the complex interactions between sex and gender, and the roles of nature and nuture are still unclear.

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In the case of cancer it is obvious that only men can get prostate cancer and breast cancer occurs predominantly in women. How gender matters is not so obvious. In this article we describe the effect of gender on psychosocial differences in men and women with prostate and breast cancer, respectively.

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	Methods

We reviewed the recent literature concerning . . . [Full text of this article]

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