Quality of life assessment in advanced stage of lung cancer patients before and after chemotherapy

Background: In India, there have been few studies discussing the QOL in lung cancer and work published from developed countries do not reflect the true context of Indian patients. Material and Method: 165 confirmed cases of advanced lung cancer, scheduled for chemotherapy, were enrolled prospectively. The information about QOL of patients was collected before and after chemotherapy, using the EORTC core questionnaire (QLQ C-30 Version 3) and lung cancer module (LC-13) and analyzed as recommended by the EORTC. Results: Mean age of the study group was 54.3 with male to female ratio of 2.8. Of all patients, 156 cases completed the assessment after chemotherapy. The significantly changed quality of life scores amongst EORTC QLQ C30 & LC13 items after chemotherapy are shown in the Table 1. On subgroups analysis between conventional chemotherapy and TKIs, vomiting and hemoptysis score(p =.00) were significantly better with TKIs. Conclusion: This study suggest that chemotherapy may improve QOL in lung cancer patients and using questionnaires to assess the QOL during treatment helps in identifying changes of the QOL and adverse effects of therapy.