Annals of Oncology Research and Therapy (Jan 2021)

Health-related quality of life of patients after breast cancer treatment: A cross-sectional study

  • Maninder Deep Kaur,
  • Budhi Singh Yadav,
  • Divya Dahiya,
  • Sukhpal Kaur,
  • Akhilesh Sharma,
  • Sushmita Ghoshal

DOI
https://doi.org/10.4103/aort.aort_17_21
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 1, no. 2
pp. 91 – 99

Abstract

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BACKGROUND: Survival for breast cancer (BC) patients has improved significantly because of better treatment availability. However, patients may experience side effects after the completion of the treatment, which consequently affect their quality of life (QoL). The present study was planned to assess the QoL of BC patients after the completion of treatment. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: One hundred patients of BC after the completion of treatment from the Department of Radiation Oncology, PostGraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India, were enrolled in the study during December 2017 to December 2018. EORTC QLQ C30/+BR23 questionnaires were used to quantify the QoL of these patients. RESULTS: The mean age of the participants was 49.35 ± 8.66 years. Mean global health status (GHS) QoL score was 64.6 ± 13.6. Functional scales, in most of the domains were high, whereas symptom scales were moderate to low for most items, showing better QoL. Pain (40.6 ± 19.1) and fatigue (54.8 ± 16.1) were the most disturbing symptoms. Patients exhibited higher scores for sexual functioning, whereas the least score was for future perspective. CONCLUSIONS: There was significant overall improvement in the QoL of patients with BC after the completion of treatment regarding functional scales and symptom scales as per EORTC QLQ-C30 questionnaire. As per EORTC QLQ-BR23 questionnaire, there was deterioration of the QoL concerning future perspectives for functional scale and hair loss for symptom scales.

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