Assessment and Improvement of Quality of Life in Patients Undergoing Treatment for Head and Neck Cancer.

Autor:	Majid A; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Sayeed BZ; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Khan M; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Lakhani M; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Saleem MM; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Rajani H; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Ramesh P; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Hashmani N; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Zia M; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Abid H; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Majid B; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Jamali M; Dow Medical College, Dow University of Health Sciences (DUHS), Karachi, Pakistan., Murtaza K; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Kamal A; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan., Hussain M; Student, Dow Medical College, Karachi, Pakistan.
Jazyk:	angličtina
Zdroj:	Cureus [Cureus] 2017 May 02; Vol. 9 (5), pp. e1215. Date of Electronic Publication: 2017 May 02.
DOI:	10.7759/cureus.1215
Abstrakt:	Introduction: We compared the pre and post-treatment quality of life in head and neck cancer (HNC) patients and identified factors that could improve the quality of life in such patients.   Methods: The European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer Quality of Life Questionnaire C30 (EORTC QLQ-C30) questionnaire was administered to 84 patients' pre and post-treatment. Patients who had non-metastatic, measurable, and untreated HNCs were invited, provided that their age was below 80 years. We did not discriminate based on treatment modality, stage of cancer, or co-morbidities. Patients who were mentally incapacitated, with secondary or recurrent HNC, distant metastasis, skin cancer, congenital anomaly of the head and neck, chronic illness, or any previous or current psychiatric illness were excluded from the study. A high mean score on the functional scale and a low score on symptom scale signify a better quality of life. We used the dependent t-test to compare pre and post-treatment scores. Results: We found no statistically significant differences in any variables, except the four symptom scales of diarrhoea, constipation, nausea/vomiting, and financial difficulty. All of these variables had increased mean scores with p values of < 0.001. Also, we found no statistical significance (p = 0.250) when comparing the pre-treatment (59.4 ± 18.3) and post-treatment (61.2 ± 16.2) scores for the global health status. Conclusion: We found no improvement in the quality of life in HNC patients despite intervention. In fact, diarrhoea, constipation, nausea/vomiting, and financial difficulty of these patients worsened post-treatment. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
Databáze:	MEDLINE
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