QUALITY OF LIFE IN PATIENTS WITH LOCALIZED BREAST CANCER TREATED WITH CHEMOTHERAPY

Objective: To investigate the quality of life of women with breast cancer undergoing chemotherapy. Methods: A cross-sectional study was carried out in a specialized cancer treatment institution. It was applied a questionnaire on quality of life (Quality of Life Questionnaire – Breast Cancer 23), translated and validated for the Portuguese, at the beginning and end of treatment. The EORTC QLQ-C30 Scores Manual was used to calculate the scores that varied from 0-100 percentage points from 30 questions. Wilcoxon’s test was performed to compare the time distributions. The level of significance was set at 0.05 and the analyzes were performed in SPSS v.25. Results: 31 female patients were included in the analysis. 51% of the patients were older than 60 years, 45% were married and 53% had university level. All patients received neoadjuvant or adjuvant chemotherapy for localized breast cancer with curative intent in the following clinical stages: I (22%), II (29%) and III (48%). 64% of the patients received anthracyclines and 87% had chemotherapy with time > 6 months. Average dose intensity for adjuvant treatment is > 90% at our institution. The perceived general quality of life had no statistical difference between the beginning and end of treatment (pre-scores: 78 and post-scores: 71, p = 0.12). As for the functional scale, there was a statistically significant difference with physical worsening (p = 0.001) and emotional improvement (p = 0.033). As for the presented symptoms, there was significant worsening in fatigue (p = 0.001) and loss of appetite (p = 0.04). There was also a tendency to worsening nausea/vomiting (p = 0.06) and constipation (p = 0.07). There was no change in the basal symptoms of pain, dyspnea, insomnia, diarrhea or financial difficulties. Conclusion: There was worsening of some baseline symptoms probably related to side-effects of chemotherapy and there was general decrease of the physical functioning; however, patients showed a significant improvement of the emotional functioning that can explain the fact that there is no difference in the general perception of quality of life. The institution has a specialized team of multidisciplinary care for all patients, and protocols to prevent the major toxicities of chemotherapy that certainly contributes to the maintenance of well-being and quality of life during treatment.