Does quality of life of prostate cancer patients differ by stage and treatment?

Abstract

Background: The lack of consensus amongst experts delineate how important it is for patients diagnosed with prostate cancer (PCa) to make an informed decision on available treatment options through an objective discussion of the risks and benefits. One of important benefits could be seen as patient's quality of life (QoL) after treatment. We aimed to assess QoL differences in prostate cancer patients by stage and treatment for a population-based sample.

Methods: The cross-sectional PCa patient population-based national level study for a prostate cancer patient population was performed. QoL was investigated with EORTC QLQ-C30. The analysis includes descriptive statistics and evaluation of differences in functional and symptom scales by stage and treatment group by predictors in the model.

Results: Response rate was 79.1% (N=514). The highest QoL scores were observed in localised PCa, active surveillance treatment group. The lowest scores were observed in advanced stages, chemotherapy treatment group. Between cancer stages, statistically significant differences were observed only in scales of emotional functioning (p<0.001) and social functioning (p<0.001). Between treatment groups, statistically significant differences were observed in scales of physical functioning (p<0.001), role functioning (p<0.001), emotional functioning (p<0.001), and social functioning (p<0.001).

Conclusions: Our study highlighted statistically significant differences in QoL between cancer stages and treatment. Understanding how the QoL changes in relation with the selected treatment option can be important to the urologist and individual patient to have realistic expectations as well as to optimise treatment decisions for the prostate cancer patient when exist several alternatives.