Background: The interest of quality of life remains a high priority subject on cancer patients. Pain has been recognized as a key symptom in various types of cancer; pain affects all aspects of quality of life and aggravates other symptoms. In the treatment and care of patients, nurses play an important role in assessing, supporting and helping to improve the quality of life of cancer patients.
Objective: To survey the relationship between pain severity and average score of quality of life in lung cancer patients.
Material and method: Descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted on 102 lung patients at all stages treated at Gynecology and Lung Department of Ho Chi Minh City Oncology Hospital from 3 - 6/2022. EORTC QLQ-C30 and EORTC QLQ-LC13 questionnaires were used to investigate quality of life, pain severity was assessed by the BPI-sf self-assessment questionnaire.
Results: Pain prevalence was 52% in lung cancer patients at all stages; among them, mild pain was 41.5%, moderate pain was 49.1% and severe pain was 9.1%. The average score of global health status scored was 64.9 points. Functional aspects had average scores from 56.5 - 89.7 points. The most prominent symptoms are fatigue, appetite loss and insomnia. There was a correlation between pain severity (BPI-sf) and the average score of global health status, social, physical, role functioning and symptoms of fatigue, nausea/vomiting, pain, dyspnea, insomnia, appetite loss, constipation, haemoptysis, dysphagia (EORTC QLQ-C30 and EORTC QLQ-LC13).
Conclusion: Global health status and the ability of performing social, physical and role functioning decreased with increased pain. Conversely, other symptoms worsened on the increase in pain severity.
Key words: lung cancer, quality of life, pain.