Comparison of quality of life (QOL) for patients with breast Cancer receiving adjuvant tac (docetaxel, doxorubicin, Cyclophosphamide) and fac (5-fluorouracil, doxorubicin, Cyclophosphamide) therapy

Abstract

An important issue in oncology is to evaluate Quality Of Life in breast cancer patients.Due to the lack of a comprehensive reference protocol for the use of adjuvant therapy, various therapeutic regimens have been implemented in the treatment of breast cancer. Thus, this study sought to evaluate the quality of life (QoL) of Breast Cancer patients during chemotherapy. The prospective observational questionnaire based study was conducted in Dept. of Oncology Govt. Medical College; Calicut over a period of 7 months. The quality of life of the patients was analyzed on the basis of European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer QLQ C30 & BR23 questionnaire by using Independent sample T test.The questionnaire comprised of a total of 30 questions with three different scales (functioning scales, symptoms scales and a global health status scale). It measures physical, role, cognitive, emotional and social function in the functioning scale. The symptoms scale includes fatigue, pain, nausea/vomiting, dyspnoea, insomnia, appetite loss, constipation, diarrhoea and financial difficulties. All scales are comprised of multi-item questions except the symptom scales of dyspnoea, insomnia, appetite loss, constipation, diarrhoea and financial difficulties, which are comprised of single-item questions. Higher functional score indicates better QoL and higher symptom score indicates poor QoL. Total 9 domains were significant for TAC and FAC regimen in 2 questionnaires.The use of FAC as an adjuvant therapy in most aspects was accompanied by better Quality of life than TAC.