Abstract
Purpose
Promoting physical activity among cancer survivors is a high priority. Understanding barriers to physical activity provides an evidence base to inform relevant strategies for doing so.
Methods
Telephone interviews were conducted with colorectal cancer survivors at 5 (n = 538) and 12 months post-diagnosis (n = 403). We used an ecological model of health behaviour to classify participants’ perceived barriers to physical activity into four sub-categories: physical environment, social environment, personal attributes, and disease-specific barriers.
Results
Disease-specific barriers were perceived as the greatest challenge to colorectal cancer survivors being more physically active, closely followed by personal attributes. The physical environment presented the least salient perceived barriers; however, the physical environment was most closely associated with achieving sufficient levels of physical activity at 5 months post-diagnosis. The difficulties most frequently reported by participants at both time points were belief that they were already active enough, not feeling well enough to be physically active, and experiencing fatigue.
Conclusions
These findings suggest potential points for intervention to influence physical activity among colorectal cancer survivors.
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Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Mr. Kyle Blackwell and Associate Professor Elizabeth Eakin for their assistance in developing the barriers to physical activity scale used in this study. The study was funded by Cancer Council Queensland.
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Lynch, B.M., Owen, N., Hawkes, A.L. et al. Perceived barriers to physical activity for colorectal cancer survivors. Support Care Cancer 18, 729–734 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-009-0705-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-009-0705-4