The European organization for research and treatment of cancer quality of life questionnaire: implications for prognosis in pancreatic cancer.

Background: The goal of this study was to evaluate the association between patient quality of life (QoL) and survival in pancreatic cancer patients undergoing care in a community hospital comprehensive cancer center.

Patients and methods: A consecutive case series of 55 histologically confirmed pancreatic cancer treated at Cancer Treatment Centers of America® at Midwestern Regional Medical Center was studied between 04/01 and 11/04. The EORTC QLQ-C30 was utilized to assess patient QoL. Kaplan-Meier method was used to calculate survival. Log-rank test was used to study the equality of survival distributions. Multivariate Cox regression analyses were then performed to evaluate the joint prognostic significance of those QoL and clinical factors that were shown to be prognostic upon univariate analyses.

Results: Of the 55 patients, 28 were newly diagnosed and 27 had prior treatment history. The median age was 55 years (range 33-74 years). Majority (34) had stage IV disease at diagnosis. The QLQ-C30 parameters to show statistically significant associations with survival were physical, role, and emotional functioning scales and fatigue, appetite loss, constipation, and diarrhea symptom scales.

Conclusions: We found that patient QoL, as measured by the QLQ-C30 physical functioning scale, provides useful prognostic information, independent of multiple cancer symptoms, in patients with pancreatic cancer. While these findings require further investigation in large patient cohorts, they may have important implications for patient stratification in clinical trials, as well as aid in clinical decision making.