Nurse-led cancer palliative care compared to oncologist-led cancer palliative care: A retrospective analysis of Chinese patients suffering from cancer and receiving chemotherapy.

BACKGROUND

Cancer palliative care is recommended by guidelines for patients with early stage of cancer. Unlike the Western countries, in mainland China, cancer patients receive specialist-led cancer palliative care. Nurse-led cancer palliative care (NUC) is not well established yet.

OBJECTIVES

To compare the clinical outcome measures, quality of life and symptom distress in patients suffering from cancer who received NUC with the same results in patient who received consulting oncologist-led cancer palliative care (ONC).

MATERIAL AND

METHODS

The study was a chart review of a database of patients suffering from cancer. Data regarding clinical outcome measures, quality of life and symptom distress of patients suffering from cancer who were receiving chemotherapy and NUC (NUC cohort, n = 185) or ONC (ONC cohort, n = 170) were collected and analyzed. One oncologist or 1 nurse was involved in treating 1 patient during the patient's hospital visit. Each visit took 30 min. The Chinese version of the Symptom Distress Scale was used for the evaluation of the degree of symptom distress. The simplified Chinese version of the European Organization for Research and Treatment Quality of Life Questionnaire (the EORTC QLQ-C30) v. 3.0 was used for evaluation of the quality of life.

RESULTS

Female patients preferred NUC (p < 0.0001). The pain intensity (4.13 ±1.71 compared to 3.35 ±1.01, p < 0.0001), dyspnea (3.89 ±1.48 compared to 2.82 ±0.97, p < 0.0001), constipation (3.56 ±1.78 compared to 3.06 ±1.89, p = 0.0107), and degree of symptom distress (38.09 ±7.26 compared to 35.05 ±7.92, p = 0.0002) were reported higher among patients from the ONC cohort than among those from the NUC cohort. Patients from the NUC cohort reported a better quality of life than those from the ONC cohort (70.41 ±13.62 compared to 45.63 ±7.94, p < 0.0001).

CONCLUSIONS

The NUC results in better clinical outcome measures and higher quality of life than ONC for patients receiving chemotherapy.