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Cancers
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Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment...
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Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment (Volume II)

A special issue of Cancers (ISSN 2072-6694). This special issue belongs to the section "Cancer Survivorship and Quality of Life".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 September 2024 | Viewed by 2737

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. António Araújo

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
1. Centro Hospitalar Universitário de Santo António, Porto, Portugal
2. Instituto de Ciências Biomédicas Abel Salazar, Universidade do Porto, Porto, Portugal
Interests: clinical and translational research; mechanisms and control of adverse events; strategies to improve cancer patients’ quality of life
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue is the Second Edition of a previous Special Issue, “Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment”. （link: https://0-www-mdpi-com.brum.beds.ac.uk/journal/cancers/special_issues/Quality_Effects_Cancer_Treatment）

Cancer treatment has evolved in recent years in an unimaginable way, giving our patients an increased rate of progression-free survival and/or overall survival. However, most importantly, these new drugs or new drug combinations are more patient friendly, increasing their quality of life. Nevertheless, we still have to learn how to control the adverse events that occur in target therapy, immunotherapy, and with the new drugs of hormonotherapy.

At present, we still struggle with these adverse events when combining different drugs for immunotherapy, immunotherapy with chemotherapy, or immunotherapy with target agents. Nausea and emesis induced by chemotherapy are still stressful events that we continually try to control; additionally, immune-mediated toxicity, rashes, and diarrhea induced by target therapy, and the numerous forms of pain that affect most of our cancer patients, are all still of significant concern and are the object of investigation.

We are, therefore, pleased to invite you to contribute to this Special Issue highlighting the current state of the art in the control of cancer treatments’ adverse events and in improving the quality of care of cancer patients, as well as featuring future prospects for improving therapies.

Prof. Dr. António Araújo
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Cancers is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2900 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • cancer treatment adverse events
  • quality of life in cancer patients
  • chemotherapy adverse events
  • target therapy adverse events
  • immunotherapy adverse events
  • hormonotherapy adverse events
  • chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting
  • cancer pain

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 464 KiB  
Article
The Sarcoma Assessment Measure (SAM): Preliminary Psychometric Validation of a Novel Patient-Reported Outcome Measure
by Lee Hulbert-Williams, Nicholas J. Hulbert-Williams, Ana Martins, Lesley Storey, Jennie Bradley, Hatty O’Sullivan, Lorna A. Fern, Maria Lawal, Rachael Windsor, Craig Gerrand, Jeremy S. Whelan, Lindsey Bennister, Mary Wells and Rachel M. Taylor
Cancers 2024, 16(6), 1096; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cancers16061096 - 08 Mar 2024
Viewed by 571
Abstract
The Sarcoma Assessment Measure (SAM) was developed as a sarcoma-specific patient-reported outcome measure to be used in clinical practice. We have reported in detail how SAM has been developed in collaboration with patients and healthcare professionals. The aim of this paper is to [...] Read more.
The Sarcoma Assessment Measure (SAM) was developed as a sarcoma-specific patient-reported outcome measure to be used in clinical practice. We have reported in detail how SAM has been developed in collaboration with patients and healthcare professionals. The aim of this paper is to report the preliminary validation of SAM. The 22-item SAM was administered alongside a validated quality of life questionnaire and measure of activities of daily living. Linear modelling was used to build a measure, which had predictive validity in comparison to more established outcome measures. Of the 762 patients who participated in the study, 44.1% identified as male, and participant age ranged from 13 to 82 years. Clinically, participants presented with a range of soft tissue (82.2%) and bone (21.8%) sarcomas. Our preliminary analysis indicates that SAM accounts for 35% of the global quality of life scale and 18% of the Toronto Extremity Salvage Scale (TESS); so psychometrically, it overlaps with quality of life and activities of daily living, but also measures distinct concerns. This demonstrates that this measure picks up issues that are important to patients with sarcoma that are not reflected in other measures. We have established the preliminary validity of SAM and believe it has utility as a patient-reported outcome measure both as a research tool and for assessing the impact of symptoms and dysfunction related to sarcoma as part of clinical care. Further validation using a larger and more clinically diverse sample is now needed. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment (Volume II))
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13 pages, 636 KiB  
Article
Immunotherapy in Elderly Patients—Single-Center Experience
by Maria João Ramos, Ana Sofia Mendes, Raquel Romão, Joana Febra and António Araújo
Cancers 2024, 16(1), 145; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cancers16010145 - 27 Dec 2023
Viewed by 960
Abstract
Cancer management faces a substantial challenge posed by the aging demographic. Aging is marked by accumulated DNA damage, and this phenomenon is implicated in the process of tumorigenesis. The concept of immunosenescence, postulated to manifest in elderly individuals, is defined by an age-related [...] Read more.
Cancer management faces a substantial challenge posed by the aging demographic. Aging is marked by accumulated DNA damage, and this phenomenon is implicated in the process of tumorigenesis. The concept of immunosenescence, postulated to manifest in elderly individuals, is defined by an age-related decline in T cells and a simultaneous elevation in proinflammatory status, leading to a diminished efficacy in response to immunotherapy. Notably, despite the rising prevalence of cancer in the elderly population, their underrepresentation in clinical trials persists. This underscores the unmet need to evaluate the safety and efficacy of cancer treatment in the elderly. This retrospective, single-center cohort study aimed to assess and evaluate the effectiveness and safety of immunotherapy in patients compared to younger individuals with metastatic solid tumors receiving ICI. A total of 220 patients were included, mostly males, with a median age of 64. The proportion of patients ≥ 65 years old was 56.5%. The use of ICI showed no significant differences concerning overall survival (OS) and progression-free survival (PFS) among age groups across different cancer types (melanoma, non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), renal, and bladder cancer; p = 0.388). Concerning the response to treatment in renal cancer patients, a significant difference was observed (p = 0.041), suggesting a potential negative impact of age on the treatment response. In patients that presented immune-related adverse events (irAEs), oral corticosteroid therapy was marginally associated (p = 0.059) with the elderly population. When evaluating the NSCLC population alone (n = 131, 59.5%), our study revealed a strong association between the development of irAEs, patients’ PFS and OS, and the duration of ICI treatment, but not directly correlated with age. The NSCLC elderly population presented a marginally greater number of irAEs, although without statistical significance (p = 0.86). ICI maintained efficacy and safety in elderly patients, challenging the notion that age alone should determine treatment decisions. The findings emphasize the necessity of a comprehensive geriatric assessment rather than relying solely on chronological age for personalized cancer treatment in the elderly population. Further prospective studies are needed to better understand immune responses in older adults and derive predictive biomarkers for cancer treatment. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment (Volume II))
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12 pages, 586 KiB  
Article
Factors Associated with Poor Quality of Life in Breast Cancer Survivors: A 3-Year Follow-Up Study
by Soo-Hyun Kim and Ha-Yeon Jo
Cancers 2023, 15(24), 5809; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cancers15245809 - 12 Dec 2023
Viewed by 768
Abstract
The purpose of this study was to identify subgroups of quality of life (QOL) changes in breast cancer survivors (BCSs), and to determine factors associated with subgroups of consistently low or deteriorated QOL. We enrolled 101 women recently diagnosed with breast cancer in [...] Read more.
The purpose of this study was to identify subgroups of quality of life (QOL) changes in breast cancer survivors (BCSs), and to determine factors associated with subgroups of consistently low or deteriorated QOL. We enrolled 101 women recently diagnosed with breast cancer in South Korea and asked them to complete a questionnaire at baseline (within 1 month of diagnosis), 1 year later (Year 1), 2 years later (Year 2), and 3 years later (Year 3). We assessed QOL using the global QOL subscale from the EORTC QLQ-C30. We defined low QOL as a global QOL score 10 points below the mean score of the general population. Based on low QOL as defined in this study, we identified subgroups of QOL changes over 3 years. We identified four subgroups of QOL changes: improved (47.4%), stable (30%), continuously low (8.8%), and deteriorated (13.8%), and considered the last two categories (22.6%) poor QOL. Logistic regression analyses demonstrated that significant determinants of poor QOL were insomnia at Year 1, fatigue and anxiety at Year 2, and fatigue, depression, and comorbidity at Year 3. In conclusion, persistent symptoms of insomnia, fatigue, anxiety, depression, and comorbidity are potential risk factors for poor QOL in BCSs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Quality of Life and Side Effects Management in Cancer Treatment (Volume II))
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