Abstract: Objective: To explore the effects of a cognitive-behavioral intervention on common symptom clusters of patients with gastrointestinal cancer undergoing chemotherapy. Methods: Totally 140 patients were assigned using paired design to the control group with routine care of the Oncology Department and the experiment group with a cognitive-behavioral intervention for 5 weeks, respectively. The difference regarding gastrointestinal symptom clusters, psychological symptom clusters and energy deficiency symptom clusters of the two groups before and after interventions were compared. Besides, illness perception and quality of life were compared as secondary outcomes. Results: The difference between the two groups was statistically significant in terms of the three symptom clusters, illness perception and quality of life (P<0.05). Conclusion: The cognitive-behavioral intervention can help to relieve the common symptom clusters of patients with gastrointestinal cancer undergoing chemotherapy. This intervention will also be beneficial to the clinical management over symptom clusters of patients with chronic disease.

Key words: cognitive-behavioral intervention; symptom clusters; gastrointestinal cancer; chemotherapy