Table 4.

Mean change in anxiety and depression scores^* for 325 cancer patients from recruitment to follow-up by type of cancer information provided and change in social support scores

	Change in anxiety score at follow-up			Change in depression score at follow-up
	Mean (SD) change	P value†		Mean (SD) change	P value†
		Corrected	Not corrected		Corrected	Not corrected
Type of cancer information
Selection of information:
Automatic	−0.1 (3.1)	0.28	0.19	0.1 (2.8)	0.82	0.57
Interactive	0.3 (2.9)			−0.1 (2.8)
Personalisation of information:
Personalised	−0.4 (2.9)	0.36	0.35	0.3 (2.8)	0.06	0.11
General	0.3 (3.0)			−0.3 (2.8)
Anxiety management advice:
Advice	0.1 (2.8)	0.31	0.19	0 (2.6)	0.33	0.25
No advice	0 (3.2)			0.1 (3.0)
Helgeson's social support scores
Instrumental support:
Worsening	0.6 (3.2)			0.6 (3.4)
No change	−0.2 (3.0)	0.61	0.60	−0.1 (2.5)	0.78	0.56
Improved	0.4 (2.6)			−0.3 (3.0)
Informational support:
Worsening	0.2 (3.2)			0.4 (3.4)
No change	0.2 (3.0)	0.57	0.45	0 (2.4)	0.03	0.04
Improved	−0.1 (2.6)			−0.3 (2.6)
Emotional support:
Worsening	0.4 (3.0)			0.7 (3.5)
No change	−0.1 (3.0)	0.24	0.18	−0.3 (2.5)	0.37	0.40
Improved	0.3 (2.6)			0.2 (3.0)
Negative interactions:
Worsening	1.0 (3.0)			0.7 (2.9)
No change	−0.3 (2.7)	<0.001	<0.001	0 (1.9)	0.003	0.003
Improved	−0.5 (3.1)			−0.7 (2.9)

^*From hospital anxiety and depression scale.

^†P values are presented from two general linear models. “Not corrected” is from a model of change in anxiety (or depression) score as a function of the three intervention factors and changes in social support scores (continuous factors). “Corrected” is as above but also corrected for the following factors: cancer type (breast or prostate), age (continuous factor), time (in weeks) since diagnosis (continuous factor), attitude to information, newspaper read, coping style (monitoring or blunting), “Did it change your ideas?” and “Shown it to significant others?”