Meaning-making approaches to social work practice in oncology

More than 100,000 people are newly diagnosed with cancer each year in Australia (AIHW, CA, & AACR, 2008. Despite increasing survival rates, cancer remains the second most common cause of death for men and women in Australia (AIHW, 2012). Social workers, particularly in many public hospital settings, engage with cancer patients and their families as part of a multidisciplinary support team. Meaning making approaches are a key focus of this work. This chapter presents an overview of meaning-making approaches in the Australian context. The particular goals of clinical work are described, that is, encouragement of meaning and purpose while recognizing suffering, promoting coherence, and strengthening meaning in relation to others. This broad discussion of key principles and interventions leads to the introduction of MaP Therapy. This intervention reflects other Australian models of meaning-making approaches, attending particularly to cultural and contextual factors.