Quality of life improvement in patients with bone metastases undergoing palliative radiotherapy

Verónica Cañón, Alfonso Gómez-Iturriaga, Francisco Casquero, Dirk Rades, Arturo Navarro, Olga del Hoyo, Virginia Morillo, Patricia Willisch, José Luis López-Guerra, Ana Illescas-Vacas, Raquel Ciervide, Lorea Martinez-Indart, Jon Cacicedo*

*Corresponding author for this work

Abstract

Background: The aim of the study was to analyze the impact of palliative radiotherapy on quality of life (QoL) in patients with symptomatic bone metastases. Materials and methods: We present the results from a prospective multicentric study including 128 patients who provided pre and post-radiotherapy (one month after treatment) brief pain inventory (BPI) assessments. Worst pain was recorded using the BPI (range: 0–10). Pain response was described according to the International Bone Metastases Consensus on palliative radiation. Regarding QoL, for each pre and post-radiation BPI-questionnaire, scores from the interference domains were summed and averaged to obtain an overall interference score. Results: There was a significant correlation between radiation treatment response and improvement in all functional interference domains except sleeping. Patients > 75 years old presented a significantly higher improvement in general activity, mood and relationships with others compared to patients ≤ 75 years old. Patients presenting a baseline pain score ≥ 8 showed a higher improvement in the general activity item (p = 0.049). There was no statistically significant association between pretreatment ECOG, chemotherapy, primary tumor location and radiation schedule with any of the functional interference items.

Original languageEnglish
JournalReports of Practical Oncology and Radiotherapy
Volume27
Issue number3
Pages (from-to)428-439
Number of pages12
ISSN1507-1367
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2022

Research Areas and Centers

  • Research Area: Luebeck Integrated Oncology Network (LION)
  • Centers: University Cancer Center Schleswig-Holstein (UCCSH)

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