Because cancer patients and their families have special psychological needs that are not always met through medical care, the Bowman Gray School of Medicine at Wake Forest University established the Cancer Patient Support Program (CPSP) at the Oncology Research Center. Services provided by the CPSP's 2 professional counselors and approximately 35 volunteers include counseling, patient education groups, assistance in locating needed community resources, and ongoing emotional support. This study investigated with whom CPSP counselors worked, what they actually did in the Oncology Department, and how they viewed the distribution of their time in performing their job. Data were obtained from a work-behavior job analysis instrument completed by two trained observers during a total of 100 20-minute segments. The results revealed that the CPSP counselors had the most contact with the following groups: interns (23%); patients (19%); and physicians, significant persons to patient, and unclassified individuals (10% each). CPSP counselors' activities primarily involved the helping relationship domain (25%) and the environmental and specialized studies domain (41%) of the job analysis instrument. The single most prevalent work behavior was teaching and training. Because 60.4% of the observed work behaviors nested themselves in the hospital setting, it was concluded that oncology counseling is an applied specialty that requires specialized training and preparation. (NB)