Impact of a brochure and empathetic physician communication on patients’ perception of breast biopsies

PURPOSE: This study investigated the effect of an intervention designed to reduce patients’ emotional distress associated with breast biopsy. METHODS: 125 breast biopsy patients receiving standard of care (control group, CG) were compared to 125 patients (intervention group, IG) who received a brochure with information prior to the biopsy and were biopsied by physicians trained in empathic communication. Anxiety was assessed by the State-Anxiety Inventory (STAI-S) at four time points (pre- and post-procedural, pre- and post-histology). All participants completed pre- and post-procedural questionnaires addressing worries, pain and comprehension. We evaluated the impact of the intervention on STAI-S levels using a log-transformed linear mixed effects model and explored patients’ and physicians’ perceptions of the procedure descriptively. RESULTS: Post-procedural and post-histology timepoints were associated with 13% and17% lower with STAI-S levels than at the pre-procedural timepoint on average. The histologic result had the strongest association with STAI-S: malignancy was associated with 28% higher STAI-S scores than a benign finding on average. Across all time points, the intervention did not affect patient anxiety. Nevertheless, IG participants perceived less pain during the biopsy. Nearly all patients agreed that the brochure should be handed out prior to breast biopsy. CONCLUSION: While the distribution of an informative brochure and a physician trained in empathic communication did not reduce patient anxiety overall, we observed lower levels of worry and perceived pain regarding breast biopsy in the intervention group. The intervention seemed to improve patient’s understanding of the procedure. Moreover, professional training could increase physicians’ empathic communication skills. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMBER: NCT 02796612 (March 19, 2014). SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00404-023-07058-w.