Abstract

PAREDES, Tiago; CANAVARRO, Maria Cristina  and  SIMOES, Mário Rodrigues. Impact of bone and soft tissue cancer on emotional adjustment and quality of life. Rev. Port. Sau. Pub. [online]. 2011, vol.29, n.1, pp.35-46. ISSN 0870-9025.

Introduction: The aim of the present study was the comparison of emotional adjustment and quality of life (QoL) of bone and soft tissue cancer patients that were in different phases of the disease trajectory. Material and methods: Fifty five patients between diagnosis and treatment initiation, 55 under treatment and 74 in follow-up consultations were assessed using self-report questionnaires. Seventy persons from the general population were used as control group. In the different phases of the disease the majority of patients revealed normal or mild levels of anxiety and depression but, an important minority showed moderate to severe levels. Results: In general, the emotional distress of patients in each phase of the disease was not clinically relevant and was comparable to that of healthy individuals. Only patients under treatment exhibited significant higher levels of depression compared to survivors in the follow-up phase. In diagnostic and treatment phase patients reported a poorer perception of overall and physical QoL compared to survivors and healthy controls. The impact on QoL, in general, seems more marked in the treatment phase given the worse levels of functioning in several domains of life, and the higher experience of physical symptoms, mainly compared with the follow-up phase. Free-disease survivors showed a QoL comparable to that of healthy individuals, in its different dimensions. Conclusions: The number of patients with significant levels of emotional distress (between 25 % and 29.6 % for anxiety, and 8.3 % and 23.6 % for depression), and the impact of bone and soft tissue cancer on QoL, mainly in diagnostic phase and during treatments, call to the need of implementing multidisciplinary interventions in patients with this specific cancer diagnose. These interventions should include a psychosocial component and be adapted to each phase of the disease trajectory.

Keywords : Sarcomas; Emotional adjustment; Quality of life; Disease trajectory.

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