Health-Related Quality of Life of Cancer Patients Receiving Chemotherapy | ||||
| The Egyptian Journal of Community Medicine | ||||
| Article 6, Volume 38, Issue 3, July 2020, Page 50-57 PDF (666.94 K) | ||||
| Document Type: Original Article | ||||
| DOI: 10.21608/ejcm.2020.105491 | ||||
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| Abstract | ||||
| Background: Cancer is one of the chronic diseases highly influence people's health and Quality of life (QOL). QOL has become a significant outcome measure in the treatment of cancer patients. Objective: To assess cancer patients' QOL and its related consequences in relation to different chemotherapy treatment schedules. Method: This was a cross-sectional study among 200 cancer patients in Oncology Clinic, Beni-Suef University hospital. The European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of life Questionnaire was used to measure quality of life for the participating patients. Results: The study showed that 40.5% of patients with unfavorable physical functioning and 36.5% with emotional dysfunction, while the favorable category represented 50.5%, 43% and 41% for role, social and cognitive functioning respectively. Symptoms scales showed that 62.5%, 60%, 56%, 55.5% and 50.5% of studied cancer patients had fairly favorable fatigue, pain, appetite loss, financial difficulties and insomnia respectively, while 60%, 59% and 43.5% of them had favorable symptoms of constipation, diarrhea and nausea-vomiting respectively. There was a statistically significant association between quality of life and income. The fairly favorable and enough income was 54.5% vs. 48.7% for not enough income (P=0.0001). As for onset of cancer; the fairly favorable and the less than one-year onset was 58.5% vs 34.3% for more than one-year onset (P=0.005). As for stage of cancer; the favorable and cancer stage I showed 46.7% vs 13.7% for stage 4 (P=0.001). A strong association was found between QOL and number of CT cycles. Patients treated with ≤ 2 CT cycles and fairly favorable QOL represented 56.7% (P< 0.001), 66.1% for those received 3-5 cycles and fairly favorable QOL (P<0.001) and 42.9 % for those treated with ≥ 6 cycles and unfavorable QOL (P<0.001). Conclusion: A Chemotherapy cycle may improve QOL in patients with solid tumors. Half of cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy treatment had fairly favorable QOL. | ||||
| Keywords | ||||
| Cancer; Chemotherapy (CT); Quality of life (QOL) | ||||
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