Pretreatment Nausea in Cancer Chemotherapy: A Conditioned Response?*

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Abstract
Many patients receiving cancer chemotherapy become nauseated as they anticipate their treatments. This phenomenon was studied in 18 cancer chemotherapy patients. The 8 patients who reported pretreatment nausea had more extensive disease than the other patients and had received twice as much chemotherapy. In most cases pretreatment nausea developed only after a number of months of treatment. Nausea was usually precipitated by the odor of the clinic, and similar odors elsewhere also caused nausea. Patients continued to experience nausea during follow-up visits after treatment was completed. This syndrome of pretreatment nausea can be understood as a classically conditioned response. Clinical recommendations can be made on this basis.

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