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. 2020 Oct 7:11:2040620720955002.
doi: 10.1177/2040620720955002. eCollection 2020.

Quality-of-life issues and symptoms reported by patients living with haematological malignancy: a qualitative study

Pushpendra Goswami  1 , Esther N Oliva  2 , Tatyana Ionova  3 , Roger Else  4 , Jonathan Kell  5 , Adele K Fielding  6 , Daniel M Jennings  7 , Marina Karakantza  8 , Saad Al-Ismail  9 , Graham P Collins  10 , Stewart McConnell  8 , Catherine Langton  8 , Sam Salek  11
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Quality-of-life issues and symptoms reported by patients living with haematological malignancy: a qualitative study

Pushpendra Goswami et al. Ther Adv Hematol. .

Abstract

Background: Our aim was to identify health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) issues and symptoms in patients with haematological malignancies (HMs) and develop a conceptual framework to reflect the inter-relation between them.

Methods: A total of 129 patients with HMs were interviewed in a UK multicentre qualitative study. All interviews were audio recorded, transcribed and analysed using NVivo-11.

Results: Overall, 34 issues were reported by patients and were grouped into two parts: quality of life (QoL) and symptoms. The most prevalent HRQoL issues were: eating and drinking habits; social life; physical activity; sleep; and psychological well-being. Furthermore, most prevalent disease-related symptoms were: tiredness; feeling unwell; breathlessness; lack of energy; and back pain. The most prevalent treatment side effects were: tiredness; feeling sick; disturbance in sense of taste; and breathlessness.

Conclusions: Both HMs and their treatments have a significant impact on patients' HRQoL, in particular on issues such as job-role change, body image and impact on finances.

Keywords: clinical practice; clinical research; haematological malignancy; quality of life; symptoms.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interest statement: The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1.
Figure 1.
Conceptual model for impact on HRQoL for patients with HMs. HMs, haematological malignancies; HRQoL, health-related quality of life.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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