Background and Aims
Evidence continues to accumulate regarding the association between health related quality of life (HRQL) and survival across chronic diseases. The aims of the present study were to investigate the prognostic value of HRQL in patients with hepatocellular carcinoma and cholangio carcinoma after adjusting for sociodemographic, disease-, and treatment-related factors.
Methods
A total of 321 patients diagnosed with hepatocellular or cholangio carcinoma were administered the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Hepatobiliary (FACT-Hep) instrument. Cox regression and Kaplan Meier survival analyses were performed to test the association between the five domains of HRQL and survival.
Results
Using Cox regression, overall HRQL was found to be significantly associated with survival (p=0.003), after adjusting for demographic, disease-specific factors and treatment. Subscales of the FACT-Hepatobiliary, including the physical well-being (p=0.02) and the Symptoms and Side Effects subscale (p=0.05), were also found to be significantly associated with survival after adjusting for demographic, disease specific factors, and treatment.
Conclusion
Health related quality of life was found to be prognostic of survival in patients with hepatocellular and cholangio carcinoma while covarying for demographic, disease-specific factors, and treatment. Stratifyng patients based on HRQL when testing novel treatments may be recommended.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.