Quality of life of Tunisian patients with lung cancer: descriptive study.

INTRODUCTION

No previous study has set as primary goal the evaluation of the quality of life (QOL) of Tunisian patients with lung cancer (LC).

AIM: To evaluate the QOL of Tunisian patients with LC.

METHODS

This was a cross-sectional descriptive study. QOL of 100 patients with LC (90 men) was evaluated via the QLQ-C30 and QLQ-LC13 questionnaires. QLQ-C30 data were compared with international reference values.

RESULTS

40, 38, 7 and 15% of patients had, adenocarcinoma, squamous cell carcinoma, large cell and small cell LC, respectively. 72, 20 and 8% of patients had received chemotherapy, combination of chemotherapy and surgery or radiotherapy, respectively. The means±SDs of the QLQ-C30 were 3717 (QOL), 5121 (physical activity), 3921 (life role activity), 9113 (cognitive activity), 6622 (emotional activity), 2720 (social activity), 5517 (fatigue), 5120 (pain), 820 (nausea/vomiting), 4221 (dyspnea), 6623 (insomnia), 5125 (anorexia), 4932 (constipation), 1021 (diarrhea) and 7173 (financial problems). The scores means±SDs of dyspnea, cough, hemoptysis, sore mouth and tongue, dysphagia, peripheral neuropathy, alopecia, chest pain, pain in arm or shoulder, and other pain sites were, 5116, 4523, 1319, 1819, 1017, 3430, 1522, 4720, 4534, and 1419, respectively. Comparison of QLQ-C30 data with international reference values showed an alteration of all scores except of those of emotional activity, nausea/vomiting, dyspnea and diarrhea.

CONCLUSION

Tunisian patients with LC had poor QOL.