ABSTRACT
Purpose@#Patients experiencing chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy (CIPN) apply various palliative care as well as drugs in their daily life to alleviate symptoms. There is a need to identify the influence of these efforts and patients’ psychosocial status on the relief of CIPN symptoms. This short-term prospective study investigated how prescription drugs, non-pharmacological behaviors (exercise, massage, and heat therapy), and psychological states (social support, depression, and anxiety) affected CIPN symptoms. @*Methods@#Participants scheduled to receive postoperative platinum or taxane-based chemotherapy were enrolled consecutively.CIPN was measured with the Neurotoxicity-12 subscale of the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy/Gynecologic Oncology Group-Neurotoxicity-12 instrument. Data were collected three times during the 4 or 5 cycles of chemotherapy. @*Results@#At the end of the 2nd chemotherapy cycle, 93.1% of participants reported CIPN symptoms. Multiple regression analyses showed that a heat therapy (β = -.34, p < .001), massage (β = -.21, p = .012), and walking 5 times or more per week (β = -.26, p = .021) provided relieve for CIPN symptoms. Depression (β = .19, p = .027) significantly exacerbated CIPN symptoms. @*Conclusion@#These results suggested that a comprehensive management program that includes walking, heat therapy, massage, and mood therapy should be encouraged. Moreover, patients should be educated at chemotherapy initiation to understand appropriate interventions that can relieve CIPN symptoms.