An approach from ethnography focused on the role of religiosity during the experience of breast cancer

Abstract

This work explored the role of religiosity during the experience of breast cancer of a group of women in southern Colombia. A focused ethnography was carried out where 17 women who suffer from breast cancer at any stage of the disease and who had completed the first year of treatment participated. The information was collected through a discussion group and ten semi-structured interviews. The thematic analysis was used to treat the data. For the women, religiosity was essential for the acceptance of the illness, assuming it as an opportunity for personal growth and also, they considered it a source of coping during the illness. It is concluded that approaching the role of religiosity, from the voices of women, reveals the essential role it plays during the breast cancer trajectory and the need of the inclusion of religious care as an essential component for women during the illness. It also calls for the importance that research on this illness not be focused only from a biomedical perspective.