The effect of burdensome symptoms and functional status on quality of life among older patients with cancer: A correlational study.

PURPOSE: The current study aimed to assess the effect of burdensome symptoms and functional status on QoL among Jordanian older patients with cancer presenting to outpatient clinics. METHODS: A correlational design was implemented to collect data from 165 older patients with cancer visiting outpatient oncology clinics. RESULTS: Generally, the participants have a relatively low quality of life (M = 52.22 ± 24.57). The highest needs according to their functional status were difficulty walking a long distance (M = 3.06 ± 1.004; physical functional status), feeling limited in pursuing hobbies or leisure time activities (M = 2.32 ± 1.05; role functional status), feeling nervous (M = 2.36 ± 1.01; emotional functional status), having difficulty concentrating (M = 2.15 ± 1.04; cognitive functional status), and that physical condition or medical treatment interfered with their social activities (M = 2.36 ± 1.10; social functional status). Further, the most common distressing symptom was insomnia (n = 90, 54%), followed by fatigue (n = 79, 47.9%). Lastly, quality of life improved with better functional status (the strongest correlation was with the role functional status: r = 0.503, p < .001) and declined with higher symptom severity (the strongest correlation was with fatigue: r = -0.566, p < .001). CONCLUSIONS: To conclude, the current study sheds light on older patients with cancer burdensome symptoms and functional status and their effect on quality of life. The findings suggest that patients suffer from several functional limitations and distressing symptoms that affect their quality of life, necessitating screening and corrective actions from healthcare providers.

Complete Decongestive Therapy Effect on Breast Cancer Related to Lymphedema: A Systemic Review and Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.

PURPOSE: To review and analyze critically the available evidence for Complete Decongestive Therapy Effect on Breast Cancer Related to Lymphedema. DATA SOURCES: Publications were retrieved from the major database search engines, included  Google scholar, EBSCO host, and PubMed database. The search terms including: "Complete decongestive therapy (CDT)", "breast cancer", "Breast cancer related to lymphedema (BCRL)" "breast surgery" and "mastectomy". STUDY SELECTION: The studies were initially selected based on keywords associated with inclusion criteria. Then, articles were chosen based on their titles. Then, based on the fill text and design, randomized control with a comprehensive description of the outcomes. The authors analyzed 3,181 articles, of which 15 randomized controlled trials met inclusion criteria with no publication date constraint. DATA EXTRACTION: Each article's authors, nations, participants, outcomes variables, measuring instruments, intervention technique and follow-up, outcomes, and results were retrieved. After reaching consensus among authors, study quality was evaluated using the Jadad scale, and risk of bias was determined using the Cochrane Rob2 tool. DATA SYNTHESIS: The levels of evidence were of excellent quality. The retrieved articles were of "high" methodological caliber. The major outcome variables were in QOL, pain, ROM and edema. The effect size of CDT on QOL was 2.347 (95% CI: -1.41, 6.11) (p=0.22). Pain was -0.068 (95% CI: -35.21) (p=0.64). ROM was 0.324 (95% CI: -0.44,0.09) (p=0.41) and edema was -2.9 (95% -1.53,1.11) (p=0.76). CONCLUSIONS: The CDT is still recommended as the primary therapy for BCRL and is regarded the most practical and cost-effective treatment for BCRL. This result recommends patients to perform CDT to improve their QOL, ROM, and to lessen pain and edema volume. To improve the body of evidence supporting the effectiveness of the CDT on BCRL, additional trials with bigger sample sizes, longer follow-ups, blindness outcomes, and patient compliance evaluations are required.

Measuring the Quality of Life among Head-and/or-Neck Cancer Patients with Oral Mucositis Using the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General in Jordan.

OBJECTIVE: Quality of life (QOL) in cancer patients can be influenced by the presence of medical conditions, such as oral mucositis (OM). There is still limited knowledge about this issue among patients in Jordan, and this could be related to the absence of research instruments testing QOL among cancer patients with OM. This study measured the QOL among cancer patients using the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-General (FACT-G), Arabic version. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study on 118 head-and/or-neck cancer patients with OM in Jordan. Data were submitted to measures of normality, reliability, and validity using exploratory factor analysis. The study also measured QOL among the study sample. RESULTS: FACT-G demonstrated good internal consistency reliability and validity. Factor analysis indicated the presence of four factors explained by 24 items representing a valid FACT-G, Arabic version. Scores reflected low QOL compared to reported normative values in the literature. The values used to compare findings from this study were extracted from international literature; no similar values were present in published literature. CONCLUSIONS: FACT-G, Arabic version, is valid and reliable when applied to this study population. Further testing is recommended, which would include the establishment of normative values.

Incidence and Risk Factors of Oral Mucositis in Patients with Breast Cancer Who Receiving Chemotherapy in Al-Bashir Hospital.

Background: Oral Mucositis (OM) remains the most common side effect of chemotherapy affects negatively on patients' quality of life. Subjects and Methods: Convenience samples of patients who received chemotherapy were followed from first or second cycle of chemotherapy until OM occurrence. We reviewed 75 female patients with breast cancer who received chemotherapy with mean age (47.2 SD ± 8.62861). We used WHO scale to assess the severity of OM. Demographic and other variables (age, number of cycle before appearance of signs of OM, WBC count, neutropenia count, creatinine and BMI) were filled in questionnaire. Results: 81.3% of reviewed patients were suffering from OM and (52.4%) of them were shown score 2 according to WHO classification, Taxane included chemotherapy protocol was the only significant variable that associated with OM occurrence (p=0.009). Conclusion: In this study; Taxane is the only risk factor that significantly associated with occurrence of OM.