Jeffrey S Soni1
,
Azuka C Oparah1,
Frederick Osejie2,
Iyayi M Osifo1,
Sanusi O Yusuf3,
Maria A Aghahowa4
For correspondence:- Jeffrey Soni Email: sonijeffrey@yahoo.com Tel: +2348038190403
Published: 31 December 2017
Citation: Soni JS, Oparah AC, Osejie F, Osifo IM, Yusuf SO, Aghahowa MA. Quality of life of patients treated for prostate cancer in a Nigerian hospital. J Sci Pract Pharm 2017; 4(1):169-176 doi: 10.47227/jsppharm.v4i1.4
© 2017 The author(s).
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Purpose: Prostate cancer is the commonest cancer affecting men with high mortality profile. Known interventions improve quality of life. The study aim at assessing the quality of life, identify the prevailing treatment pattern and common hormonal treatment side effects among the patients and to test the validity of the EORTC QLQ-C30 and QLQ-PR25 modules in a Nigerian setting.
Methods: The study was conducted at the Urology Clinic, University of Benin Teaching Hospital. Patients who met the inclusion criteria were approached and consenting patients were directed to respond to the self-administered EORTC QLQ-C30 and QLQ-PR25 questionnaires. Patients’ demographic and clinical characteristics were profiled. Responses to items on the questionnaire were fed into Microsoft Excel software package and analyzed using SPSS and Graph-pad for descriptive and inferential statistics.
Results: A 92 % response rate was recorded, the reliability of the instrument yielded a Cronbach’s Alpha of 0.817. The Mean score for the respective sub-scales were all above their midpoint. The highest and lowest translated percentage scores were 89.0% and 54.0 % for Physical Functioning and Sexual Activity respectively. Prostatectomy resulted in a significant reduction in sexual functioning and activity for most of the patients. Over half of the patients were observed to have undergone prostatectomy and were also managed with drugs as adjunctive treatment. However, patients were managed on drugs alone.
Conclusion: The EORTC QLQ-C30 and QLQ-PR25 modules are valid in this study setting. The QoL were on a high level in all domains to varying extent. Prostatectomy was the prevailing pattern of managing prostate cancer patients. The most disturbing hormonal treatment symptoms were reports of feeling less masculine, followed by pedal edema
